Knotts over River Dee

It has been an awesome year though sadly we have photograohed less wildlife than in previous years. This is largely due to Kyra, our springer spaniel. We gave her a home in early April and immediately took her with us to Scotland. We saw lots of stuff and took pictures but that was mainly when driving about, when were able to leave her in the car for 10 minutes or so. We had another glorious two weeks on Isle of Mull in July, a couple of weeks in Cornwall and a week in Glenelg at half term. The Glenelg week we shared with family and were relieved to see an otter on the last full day (My brother was beginning to think we were making up all our previous sightings) It wasn't the greatest quality sighting but still much appreciated by all. I would say on the whole it has been the year of the White Tail eagle (or possible Short eared owl) We had some incredible White Tail views in Scotland this year. We've seen Short Eared Owls in Scotland and on Wirral- Burton Marshes. At school we have found two lots of Spraint by the ponds (firstly back in May and then more recently) This was coupled with a security guard claiming he'd seen an otter and then further claims by him which lead to us staking out the ponds only to detemine that the "otter" he was regularly seeing in broad daylight was, in fact, a mink. The spraint was genuinely otter though- so clearly we are getting the occasional visitor during the night. We also had the kestrels nesting on the building -we were away when the young fledged but have since seen the family together around the grounds. Hopefully the parents may return next year. It has been a full on busy Christmas Term and we have often used our 36 hours a week of free time to escape to see family in Wirral for a break. These pictures were taken last weekend and show a glorious evening over the Marine Lake at West Kirby. A fly past by a huge flock of knots was a spectacular sight. Merry Christmas all and here's to a wild year in 2013.