Mull has surprised me in a couple of ways. The first is the number of non-Mullets (immigrant Mull residents) on the island. Most people seemed to have hailed from the Midlands. Indeed, Russell my photographer dubbed the island 'SoliMull'!
The remainder of people seemed to come from Yorkshire, Newcastle with a couple folk from the Big Smoke. The other nice thing about Mull is the friendliness of the people. Everyone's got time for everyone.
My talk tonight was a classic example. I spoke about urban birding in Wormwood Scrubs and the Mull Bird Club audience seemed inspired to look at city birding in a different light. They very kindly gave me a bottle of wine after as a sign of appreciation.
Today we spied a pair of calling Golden Eagle soaring against the dramatic backdrop of a snow clad mountainside. It was an adult (probably a male) and an immature that was clearly bigger, thus presumably a female. A magical sight that was only my second Scottish Goldie in my life. We also saw a male and 2 female Hen Harriers, a Woodcock, a Jack Snipe (scarce on the island) and we dipped on a couple of Snow Buntings. Yesterday, we had White-tailed Eagles and I found a 1st winter Iceland Gull.
My RSPB guides, the lovely Debby Thorne and Dave Sexton also took me to Loch Beg a place were chief Otter spotter Dave found at least 3 frolicking by the coast. Nice!
Iain Gibson, TUB & Jim Coyle in Glasgow
Finally, on Monday whilst in Glasgow I hung out with 2 Glasgow City Council officers, Iain Gibson and Jim Coyle, who very kindly took me around showing me some of the city's birding spots. We managed to see Tree Sparrows, Yellowhammer, Whooper Swan, Water Rail and a couple of Jack Snipe.
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