Whales & Wagtails.

On Sunday past a Minke whale and her calf paid a brief visit to the bay. We saw the calf first and thought porpoise, only when the mother broke the surface a few seconds later did we realise a whale and her calf. A brief visit that gave glimpses rather than good views, by the time binoculars snapped them into focus they had already taken a breath and were curling back beneath the water of the bay, their long streamlined bodies with a low dorsal fin barely making a ripple as they slipped back beneath the surface. North Bay is wide and shallow, in the past there have be strandings, a thrill to see them but also a relief to watch them turn away from the shallows and head back out into Scapa Flow.

A quiet week in our own garden, Jacqui has been planting a garden a few miles away, a long narrow rectangle a stones throw from the sea that is enclosed by low dry-stone dykes on three sides and the house on the fourth. I tidied up the dykes last year and ran a tiller over the ground. In  autumn jacqui planted a selection of bulbs, now perennials are going in. A mix of plants, some grown by the owners, some bought in, some from our garden. The plot is wet and north facing so there’s a bias towards damp and shade lovers. Primulas and hostas along with the likes of siberian iris should do well there.

I spent a few days working on a plot next door to our meadow. Our soon to be neighbours are like minded souls, their house has yet to be built but a meadow is already in progress, dozens of young trees have also been planted. This week a pond was dug close to the shore. Kevin the excavator owner working his magic and turning a patch of wet mud into a wildlife haven. Before Kevin left he tracked across the land and dug another pond for us, he dug two here last year, one in each corner of the meadow. With hindsight we regretted not making them bigger. Financially liners aren’t an option and despite the ground down there being permanently wet there was always the nagging thought of “what if they don’t hold water”. We shouldn’t have worried, within days the ponds had filled. Within a week or two whirlygig beetles were twirling and spinning over the surface of the water and diving beetles were being seen, rising from the depths to steal silver bubbles of air.

One of the original ponds got a tweak, doubled in size and given a wide shallow area for waders. The other got a twin, a new pond dug along side it. Eventually, when everything settles and the water levels rise, the ground that divides them will become a small narrow island. The ponds are an important part of what we are doing here, true wildlife magnets. Today brought mallards on the water with curlews and oystercatchers probing the shallows. As they were dug pied wagtails and meadow pipits arrived, flitting here and there across the mud, seeking out newly uncovered snacks.

As the year moves on birds not seen since autumn are becoming familiar again. The already mentioned meadow pipits will breed just beyond the garden, hiding nests in a no mans land of tussocky grass and gone feral pink honeysuckle. A pair of pied wagtails are checking out potential nest sites in the nooks and crannies of a pile of stone that one day will become a dyke. The first chiffchaffs have been seen. In a patch of bramble on the edge of the moor a pair of  song thrushes have built a nest of dried grasses lined with mud. Siskin and redpoll are starting to arrive, at the moment in ones and twos, but soon we’ll count them in tens. Small feisty finches that hold their own on hanging feeders, refusing to give way to others twice their size. 

In the wider landscape Common gulls have returned. Named for the habitat they prefer, they nest in loose colonies on areas of rough pasture and moor. There’s a colony just along the way, perhaps fifty or sixty pairs scattered over an area of wind cropped heather. They are close to the road and as some birds sit eggs others keep guard, as you walk past the nearest of the guards will rise up and scold you, the bravest setting their wings to dive bomb your head,  veering off at the last moment and seeing you on your way.