
Beautiful day yesterday, walked part of the loop. Photos, note & map: walkmap

Beautiful day yesterday, walked part of the loop. Photos, note & map: walkmap

I arrived at the Kilpatrick hills car park at dawn this morning. It was already pretty full. Frosty with a clear sky. The full moon going down. More folk than usual on the tracks and paths. Saw a few redwing feeding on hawthorn along with blackies & thrushes.
Beautiful warm light to start, long shadows.
The frozen ground was much nicer than the usual bog between Loch Humphrey and Duncolm.
On Duncolm a raven circled diving & twisting with quiet croaks. Seemed unfazed by me and came quite close, shining in the sun. Saw a few more on the way back. A little egret in the horse field. I wonder if they come to the field when the tide is high. I saw this one at 12:30 and high tide at Old Kilpatrick was at 12:40 today. I’ll try and keep a note.
Nice view of a buzzard in a hawthorn near the road and a flock of fieldfares on the field and hawthorn.
Photos on flickr & on the
walkmap
A walk to Duncolm via Loch Humphrey & Fynloch hill in the mist & drizzle today. Very mild for the time of year. The burns are full and the paths are bogs. Some photos on a map:
walkmapPhotos, notes & map from a walk on Tuesday: walkmap



Round the Finlas Loop, warm & cloudy.
Creagan hill flora:
Mostly grass & deer grass, sparkling with wee flowers today.
Heather both ling & bog.
Heath bedstraw, cow wheat, tormentil, bog asphodel, bog cotton. Blaeberries.
Sphagnum and many other mosses.
Yorkshire fog and other grasses.

Glen Douglas, started clear, got cloudy. Warm. Lots of tiny wild flowers in the grass. 3 types of heather. Not much fauna, stonechat, a few pipets & larks, a snipe. One ringlet, lone small heath.
Didn’t get round the 3 hills, I got quite puffed going up first so just did 2.

walkmap map, photos & note
Pretty & pretty exciting walk out to Duncolm this morning. Plenty of flora & fauna. First small heath, painted lady & small copper butterflies of this year. Watch an osprey fishing over Loch Humphrey for a about half an hour (that was the exciting bit).

Walked part of the Finlas Loop yesterday. Sparking hill day, snow. A lot of deer. Deer seem less inclined to run off in the winter. Fox track all over. A glimpse of an eagle, later watched for 10-15 minutes as it circled back and forth along the skyline above.
map, photos & notes: walkmap

Doune Hill & Beinn Eich via Glen Mollochan
Overcast day with a threat of rain later.
Clouds low, on the top of the hill a few times. Quite a breeze higher up.
Quiet, no one else on the hill.
Not much in the way of wildlife, a few deer & the odd raven croak.
Notes & photos: walkmap