Osprey Magic
No trip to Speyside is complete without time spent with its Ospreys – either when they are catching fish or better still when they are at their nest.One of the most magical days I have ever spent with wildlife was when I was in a hide overlooking the nest of a pair of Ospreys.I spent ten hours in the hide, twenty foot off the ground, and in that time the male brought fish an incredible nine times. The excitement generated when he arrived with his fish was hard to describe and I do not know who was more excited me or the female Osprey!! www.facebook.com/gordonyateswildlife
No trip to Speyside would be complete without time spent in the forests filming Crested Tits. They will readily come to feed on a bag of peanuts and the more severe the weather all the better for your photos. However, make sure you go before mid March because in most years by then Crested Tits thoughts turn to breeding and they head deep into the forests and are hard to find. www.facebook.com/gordonyateswildlife
If you are going to visit Speyside in winter then in addition to Ptarmigan you have to go in search of Mountain Hares. The good news is that you do not have to scale Cairngorm mountain to find the Hares, in fact a better option is the Findhorn valley, where you do not have to have crampons on your boots to reach your target. All this weeks photos were taken on my last visit to the Findhorn valley where, after a two hour trek, I came across an incredible twenty six Hares in the snow! Do I need to go again? Of course I do! www.facebook.com/gordonyateswildlife
In previous years the early part of the year has seen us heading up the slopes of Cairngorm in search of Ptarmigan. When the Funicular Railway was working it was relatively easy to reach the summit and I was once stood on top before 10.00am!! Those days are long gone with the railway out of action together with my injured knee! It is still the best place in Scotland to film Ptarmigan but beware – in winter the summit of Cairngorm is covered in ice and you will need crampons attached to your boots to avoid sliding down the mountain. I once slid twenty foot, together with the camera, and thought I had come away unscathed until I noticed later that the front element of my 300mm lens was chipped, effectively reducing its value by more than a grand! Photos from my last successful trip are in the Gallery. www.facebook.com/gordonyateswildlife
Despite covid, bad weather and finally injury its not been a bad year for the camera. Thousands of photos were taken and it is always a difficult job to pick ten of the best. However, pride of place this year goes to two of our rarest Grebes. I finally got photos of the Black Necked Grebes in Yorkshire and then the big surprise of the year to come across a family party of Slavonian grebes with young by a public footpath in Inverness.