I was looking forward to June, as I had a number of wildlife trips planned. For the first 8 days, I was in the Outer Hebrides and this was followed later in the month by a day trip to the red squirrel & red kite hides at Argaty Red Kites in Doune. I also managed to spend an evening and an early morning photographing ospreys at the Trossachs Osprey Hide near Callander.
I’ll keep this post short as I have already written about my Outer Hebrides & Argaty Red Kites trips & you can read about them here – Outer Hebrides & here Argaty Red Kites
I’ll be going back to the Trossachs Osprey Hide shortly, so I will leave my update until then.
Otherwise, back in Edinburgh, the wildlife is very hard to spot at the moment, due to thick foliage and plenty leaves on the trees. However, this gives our wildlife a lot of protection and that’s the main thing. One thing that has been very apparent, is that there has been a distinct drop in kingfisher sightings, at specific sections, on the Water of Leith. Unfortunately, it would appear that the council have removed almost every low hanging branch along the river from Pansy Walk to the Roseburn play park. I was informed that this was something to do with flood prevention scheme but what they have done is remove every kingfisher perch on that stretch. So we have had no kingfisher chicks in that section this year.
Additionally, the next kingfisher territory from Roseburn to Dean Village seems not to have any kingfisher chicks either. This is very unusual as it has nothing to do with the council and remains unexplained. The kingfisher activity is normal at the usual areas downstream from Stockbridge to Bonnington and also upstream from Gorgie Road to Bog’s Bridge. Hopefully in July’s post I can report a bit more activity!
Here are a handful of shots from June.