Outer Hebrides, the Uists, Benbecula and Berneray
My first visit to the Uists was courtecy of the University of East Anglia Soil Science department in April 1974 when we travelled by train to Oban and took the long ferry to Lochboisedale for a week camping in the dunes adjacent to Vorran island where unbeknown to us there was a long staying drake Steller’s Eider! How we failed to see it by accident I still do not know but having learnt about its presence later in 1974 I returned with Jude in late May 1978 in the faithful Mini clubman and we duly found said Eider still in residence and saw some late flocks of Pomarine Skuas amongst other great birds. It was a further 31 years before we returned in early August 2009 but 2010 we were back again in April for a cracking week. Sophie’s archaeology studies provided a good excuse for another early April visit in 2015 and this year we headed back in early June. A selection of somewhat randomly arranged images of the area follows. The Uists are am amazing place when the weather is good but they can be grim when its bad and I do not think I could survive a winter there with the incessant wind. Snowy Owl is occasional but Corncrakes and breeding Hen Harriers, Golden and White-tailed Eagles are more predictable in late spring summer.
April is a great month for visible migration with huge numbers of Whooper Swans, Barnacle and a few Greenland White-fronted Geese passing through along with occasional throngs of Icelandic Redwings and the sea can still hold large flocks of Long-tailed Ducks and Great Northern Divers. Residents include the Hebridean race of Song Thrush and the Hebridean Wren and some of the last real Rock Doves with Loch Druibeg holding a gang of Shetland Ponies that are anyone’s friend for a few carrots.
