Have you ever tried to creep up on a cuckoo? I’ve tried repeatedly over the years but it’s nigh on impossible. I suspect even the SAS would struggle. Cuckoos are impossibly flighty, and somehow also evade being precisely pinpointed by your ear. A vague direction can be discerned, but when you think you’re getting close, the call suddenly seems to come from another direction entirely. It could be another cuckoo of course, but more often than not, your target cuckoo has simply taken flight and moved to a new location. You didn’t see it move because….well….what would that even look…

Frogs or toads? A simple choice, one that I put to Twitter last week to gauge people’s feelings towards these two amphibians. I was motivated partly by the fact that the spring amphibian emergence is underway and I very much welcome their return, but mainly I was motivated by a desire to see to what proportion of people shared my preference. Just for the record, I do of course acknowledge that this is an absurdly reductionist way of looking at these two wonderful creatures. But yes, I hereby declare I am a fully paid up member of Team Toad. I…

I recently had the good fortune to be working in Glen Quoich on three consecutive days. And on each of those occasions I took time to sit quietly among the veteran pines, with my coffee and lunch, and take-in the atmosphere of regenerating Caledonian woodland. It’s one of the most restful places I know. Indeed when we were released from our local authority lockdown limits during the Covid pandemic, this is the first place I visited. Now managed by the National Trust for Scotland, where better to be restored than the very place where restoration hangs in the air? Given…

As the summer progresses and my skin plays host to various biting beasties, I find myself pondering which of them is the most infuriating. Which of them is most likely to sabotage my outdoors enjoyment? I have my own personal torments, but I’m curious what other people think about our wee beasties. Time therefore, for a famously unscientific poll to see how you, the outdoorsy folk, feel about them. I asked…. Which of these lovely wee critters traumatises you the most when you’re trying to enjoy Scotland’s great outdoors? There are of course a whole host of annoyances out there,…

Everyone has their favourite Scottish animal, the one they’re always on the lookout for, the one that stops them in their tracks. But while I love a white-tailed eagle or a red squirrel as much as the next person, my favourite Scottish animal isn’t big, fluffy or familiar. It’s small, it’s uncommon and it’s downright weird. Erm…..it’s a beetle. Yes, I can hear your inward groans, but bear with me. It’s actually surprising to encounter something utterly alien. By that I mean, we’re all generally aware that insects are enormously varied in appearance but we nevertheless expect the ones we…