When the wind blows

Well the hatches are battened down here as the high winds battering the West and North coasts of Scotland this weekend blow outside, it was gusting 40 knots here at breakfast this morning!! Along with the wind there have been several hail showers and the odd rumble of thunder.

Definitely a weekend for staying indoors and catching up with all the birding mags that have arrived in the post over the last couple of weeks. Coupled with the latest twist in the broken leg saga - DVT - a weekend of rest sounds good to me.

This weekend should have seen the local ringing group heading off to the Northern isle of Sanday with the primary aim to ring Sanderling and Purple Sandpipers as part of two ongoing projects (See: http://www.orkneyrg.co.uk/wader.html).

However due to the forecast winds it was decided to postponed the trip for a couple of weeks.

So it was very fortuitous that I decided to make a brew just after 10 this morning. As I walked into the kitchen I glanced out of the window to see a Sparrowhawk sitting on one of the handrails for the steps from the patio up to the lawn.

It was studying the two bushes either side of the steps very carefully and on several occassions disappeared into the bushes after the sheltering House Sparrows. Fortunately for the House Sparrows it left after about 10 minutes without a catch.