Sophie Bennett
Reading the Hill Through Its Birds
The Scottish Highlands reward slow walkers. Ramble along a glen at speed and you will register a lot of grey rock and heather, plus a few distant specks. Slow down, though, and the hills start to speak: a dry croak from a boulder field, a shape hanging on the updraught above a corrie, a fluting song from a rowan thicket. Birds are the most reliable clue to what a piece of upland habitat is actually doing, and learning three or four of them will transform a walk.
The three species below are the ones I am asked about most often, and between them they cover the whole height range, from the treeline to the summits. None requires specialist kit, but all three benefit from patience and a decent pair of binoculars.
Listen Before You Look
Upland birds are often heard long before they are seen, and the sound travels beautifully in thin, still air. Wind is your enemy, so plan a route with the breeze at your back where you can, and stop regularly rather than trying to identify calls while walking. Ten minutes standing still at a viewpoint will usually produce more than an hour of striding past one.
Three calls worth fixing in your memory:
- Ptarmigan — a harsh, rolling croak, like a small engine failing to start, often given as a rattling "krrrruk" from close by. It is a contact call, not a song, and it frequently betrays a bird you would otherwise have walked straight past.
- Golden eagle — mostly silent, but listen for thin, yelping whistles in early spring. Quiet hills with a strong thermal are worth watching regardless.
- Ring ouzel — a melancholy, fluting song, like a blackbird sung in a wilder key, with long pauses and a sharp "tuck-tuck" alarm that is often the first clue to a bird's presence.
Ptarmigan: The Bird of the High Tops
Ptarmigan are true specialists, living above roughly 700 metres on the high plateaux and rocky ridges. They are the only British bird that turns white for winter, and the change is gradual rather than instant: in November you may see birds still mottled grey with white patches, and by January they can be almost invisible against old snow. In summer, both sexes adopt a bark-like grey-brown plumage with a red wattle over the eye, and cocks can look surprisingly reddish on the breast and back.
Because they moult into cryptic plumage and sit tight, most encounters begin with a sudden, explosive whirr as a bird flushes from almost underfoot. If that happens, pause and scan the surrounding boulders, because ptarmigan usually sit in loose coveys of three to ten birds. Winter is arguably the best season for finding them, when snow pushes them onto wind-scoured ridges and the white plumage gives them away against dark rock.
Golden Eagle: Reading the Sky
Golden eagles need space, and the best way to find one is to stop looking for a bird and start reading the landscape. They favour big, open glens and hill systems with crags, ledges and a reliable supply of mountain hares and red grouse. Look for a large, dark, long-winged shape soaring on a thermal, holding its wings in a shallow V and gliding on obviously flat, plank-like wings.
The classic confusion species is the buzzard, which is far more numerous and often soars in similar conditions. Size is genuinely useful if you can judge it against a hillside, but the proportions matter more: an eagle's wings are long, broad and parallel with a short, protruding head, while a buzzard looks stubbier and more rounded.
Late winter and early spring are the months for display. On a bright, breezy March day you may see undulating, roller-coaster flights, with the bird folding its wings and plunging before rising again. Watch from a distance and enjoy it without approaching any nest ledge — this is a schedule 1 species and disturbing it at the nest is a criminal offence.
Ring Ouzel: The Mountain Blackbird
The ring ouzel is a summer visitor, arriving from North Africa in April and leaving by September. It looks like a slim blackbird wearing a white bib on the breast, with paler, silvery-edged wing feathers that catch the light. Favoured habitat is steep, heathery ground with crags or gullies, scattered rowans and bilberry, typically between 200 and 800 metres.
The song is the giveaway: fluting and sorrowful, with long gaps, delivered from a crag edge or the top of a rowan. If you hear it, look for a burst of song followed by a glide down to feed, and listen for the "tuck-tuck" alarm if a bird feels you are too close. Scotland holds the bulk of the British population, so a quiet day in the Mounth or the eastern Cairngorms is a fair bet.
Fieldcraft: Watching Without Disturbing
Good fieldcraft is simply about not adding pressure to birds that already live on tight margins, and it makes for better watching too. Some practical rules:
- Keep a generous distance from nests and crags in the breeding season, roughly April to July. Use binoculars rather than your feet, and never approach a ledge for a photograph.
- Keep dogs on a short lead on high ground between March and August, and under close control year-round.
- Avoid playing recorded calls on the hill. Playback can pull birds off nests and stress them at the worst possible time.
- Move away if a bird alarm-calls, flies repeatedly around you or feigns a broken wing. All three mean you are too close.
- Note the season and the weather as well as the sighting. A hill you know in March will feel and sound completely different in July, and keeping a simple notebook will sharpen your ear faster than almost anything else.
