St John's Pool Bird Photography

25/03/2026

NEW ARCTIC TERN NESTING SITE AT PUBLIC HIDE
AN UNBELIEVABLE EFFORT - by the team of vols. on Sunday 22 March (plus some prep on 20th) to take apart the mess that was in front of the main public hide; clean most of the gravel; lay w**d suppressor pondliner; replace flagstones; fill crazy paving with cleaned gravel and cement edges; then 'mould' nesting 'cups' in extra gravel ready for the new occupants in May.
Also the 'Wild flower Squad' prepped the ground in front of the entrance and planted Ox-eye daisies and a meadow mix of seeds.

Some of you seasoned observers will be asking,
"Why are you building another Arctic tern nest site - I thought there was already one right in front of the hide?"

Correct - BUT if we'd left the ground as it was nobody would be able to see the birds on the platform for the w**ds; We can't use w**dkiller or cut the w**ds through the breeding season; SO this solution clears the w**d issue almost 'permanently' AND we'll all be able to watch (hopefully) even more successful breeding Arctics this year. Keep you posted.

Thanks a million to Julie, Dexter, Gary, Su, Don, Mary and Rosemary. Awesome work!

SORRY FOR INCONVENIENCE FOLKS - SJP WILL RE-OPEN FOR THE 2026 SEASON OVER EASTER WEEKEND... UNLESS WE NEED TO FIX SOMETHING!😁👍

03/03/2026

SJP WORK PARTY - 1 MARCH 2026
"The best and most productive ever!"

That was the unanimous verdict of 'the judges'.
29 volunteers from Caithness Environment Volunteers (cheers as ever Paul!!) and Dunnet Forestry Trust, plus the organisers makes 33 of us for about three hours - which is a lot of man and woman hours for a Sunday morning.

JOBS:

THE WOOD CHIPPER -
A Massive shout out to Garrance at Dunnet Forestry Trust for organising the use of their machine - and bringing her amazing team of young people!
And it was soo-o-o good to see such a spread of ages. The Young and not-so-young people were super enthusiastic helpers and kept the chipper fully occupied for most of the duration - feeding it all the elder/willow cuttings from last year - and spreading the chippings along the main path and down the tunnel entrance to Tern Hide. Good work team!

TERN HIDE - Entrance had been blocked by a landslide over winter and needed clearing - done - then the tunnel sides were shored up with some handy shower wet-wall panels and planks of sarking. Sorted. And what a fine job lads.

ARCTIC TERN PLATFORM - In the space of precisely no time at all the whole 'beach' had been cleared of rampant Rose-bay willowherb roots and a very lush moss carpet. I have no idea how it happened! But looks perfect for the arrival of this year's colony.

WADER HIDE - Shingle beach and Pool 4 bund - The stones required a serious cleaning as soil had permeated between and under the whole area. Ingenious use of a riddle and the extra hands made light of what would have been a very tough mini project.

WADER HIDE - Tunnel entrance 'roof' Camouflage netting is now decaying and the man made material is flying around the place. Needed removing and a new 'eco -friendly' alternative attached to the planking. Clever use of the just-cut elder whips makes a great natural screen from the birds - at zero cost! WADER HIDE - Floor replacement Just started the remedial work on the flooring which is ready to burst- the result of damp creeping underneath. Replacement base for photographers may be recycled plastic wood panels and lookalike timber - still to purchase and begin tho...

STARLING NEST BOXES Five pre-prepared boxes courtesy of Paul at CEV and Thurso schoolchildren were installed on the original JC hide and Wader Hide SO with the CEV AGM in the main hidefollwed by everybody filling up on home-made soups and other refreshments - the mammoth effort came to a very satisfactory ending. Three hours later I'd finished the washing up!

BIRD NEWS:
A Green-winged teal drake on the pool on 26 & 28 January. This is the 8th record for the pool;
A sub-adult White-tailed eagle flew low over the pool on 29 Jan. buzzing the 160 European teal without picking off a fly-through snack. It disappeared over Dunnet heading south;
Cormorants peaked at 13 on 22 February WeBS count. This is definitely a loch record (for me anyway)
Great egret - single(s)have been around the loch over the first couple of months ...he says casually. How quickly we forget these were county 'rares' not very long ago;
The loch has been generally poor for numbers and variety with only one or two Pochard; Tufties well down on normal and only first Gadwalls appearing this week, with no longterm winterers.

So a few more jobs to fix - like a brand new floor in Wader hide (eek!) and then the first Sandwich terns should be in already.
Looking froward to even better breeding productivity this year than the very encouraging 2025 season.

03/12/2025

It's nearly 2026 already! Incredible. 2025 at SJP will be notable for ... not a lot to be honest but the standout highlight has to be the increase in Sandwich tern colony from 40 to 60 pairs with a similar number of fledged young (c.60 at least). This is a reasonably good productivity score for any year but in a 'recovery phase' from HPAI in 2021 and a low of just 20 pairs in 2022 - I'd take that any day of the week! The (field sketch oil painting) is one of mine from a couple of years ago showing adult Sandwich terns with a food-begging chick.

In other news:
Great (white) egrets seem to becoming a regular feature on the shores of St John's Loch - especially round the harbour area. Who'd have imagined?! The photo of a Great white egretis from Loch of Mey where up to five have been seen and appear to be a permanent fixture now.
Little egret was added to the 'garden list' on 23 October with a single bird on the loch - conveniently enjoyed with a Great egret flypast just before its smaller cousin headed off to Loch of Mey - where it was later seen. The running score is now 212 plus additional species by other birders.

Unfortunately SJP will be CLOSED til mid-January for management works and also BIRD FLU has not gone away! A single dead Greylag was seen this week.

SORRY for any inconvenience - but we will be back and ready to roll in the spring.

IF anybody is up for helping with WORK PARTIES in 2026- please get in touch on this page or text / call on the number on the board. Thanks in advance - we always appreciate any help... and there might even be cake for the volunteers!!?

Merry Christmas and a great New Year to all the followers of SJP.
Cheers

Julian

08/06/2025

It's been a while - but stuff happens... or in the case of migrants this year ... it doesn't. We've had a shocker.

But before the bird news...I must start off with a massive 'thank you' to Paul and all the volunteers from Caithness Countryside Volunteers, who along with a few Caithness Bird Club members and my wonderful wife Rosemary, did a huge shift on the pool preparing the ground for the terns' arrival.

I think it's fair to say that the SANDWICH TERNS have already had a good season. The maximum single count of nesting pairs was 61 - which was a healthy 50% increase on season 2024! There appears to be a few more nesting today - but it's always difficult to know if they're new pairs or failed birds having another go. The maximum roost count was over 170 - so there is a chance that the total breeding number may be re-assessed upwards.
There was at least one brood of three chicks (a first at SJP) and several pairs still with two chicks

COMMON TERN numbers are down ( c. 12 pairs)

ARCTIC TERNS The first bird came over on 27 April with a peak count of 150 on 12 May; The breeding birds are having a tough time with egg predation - (mostly Moorhens again) Up to 70 pairs - now down to c.20.

BLACK-HEADED GULLS have increased dramatically from c350 pairs to at least 550 pairs but probably more. I imagine most breeding BH gulls in the north of Scotland are on the pool. In early April there were 1700-2000 birds at roost.

COMMON GULL c.13 pairs breeding is normal

TEAL have bred for the first time in over a decade with two ducklings seen at end of May.

GADWALL have also bred. A female and 12 ducklings were out today - 8 June. This is the largest brood ever recorded at SJP.

BLACK-TAILED GODWITS were the most conspicuous wader on spring migration, and although there were no large flocks, we had a continuous conveyor belt of birds feeding voraciously on the pool. April's total bird-day-count was a not unrespectable 61.

WHIMBREL mostly flew straight over north (weather was very clear for most of May) but a couple did drop in to roost on 12 May;

PEREGRINE - the first on the pool for over a year on 15/16 May - and for a couple of days it helped itself to BH chicks by just walking in to the reed bed. The demented adults could do nothing about it.

SHOVELER Up to six at the end of April/early May
SCAUP Male from 27 April to 1 May
TREE SPARROW 1 on 6 May
SAND MARTIN c. 170 on loch on 1 May
COMMON SANDPIPER 15 May & 3 June
ARCTIC SKUA 1 over on 18 May
LESSER BLACK-BACKED GULL 1 (intermedius) on 18 May
BLACKCAP 1 singing from 9-18 May

10/06/2024

16/04/2024

Blimey - it's April 2024 - just like that!?
So, only 9 months since I posted anything - which is shocking really. Lots of stuff has happened on the pond - but most of it involved fixing everything that's gone wrong. You REALLY don't want to hear all about it -but we've worked incredibly hard to get the pool prepped for the new season, and trying to get the water management system up and running... Right now it's not. Hopefully the next solution will work reliably...
Caithness Conservation Vols did some sterling work back in March: shaved all the sticking windows and added some nice easy to use handles - so anyone can open them now - not just Arnold Schwarzeneger! They did a major w**ding sesh on Sandwich Island. Big thanks to Paul Castle and all the crew yet again. Always welcome and always grateful to have them here.
Birds in 2023:
I think it was a pretty good year on the pond to be fair.
American ducks scored big - and easily the best ever at SJP - and so did the 'breeding' Spotted crake, which despite being within 5m of a hide, nobody could see!! But OMG the sound! Just such a buzz to hear it through the night, and a real privilege.
However, after all the hullabaloo of the main migration periods - and a BIG positive in having not a single death from HPAI, the very best was saved til last.
Santa arrived a few days early with a bright orange-red surprise in the garden. On 20 December at precisely 1130, an adult American robin walked out just a few metres from the kitchen window and mixed it with the local and immigrant blackbirds, before exiting stage left, never to be seen again. I honestly expected it to hang out with the blackbirds for a while - but no - that was it despite an intensive stake out and hunt. A quick sketch and then a coloured painting is my momento for a short but simply knockout experience; the first American landbird for SJP and the second for Caithness. Just wish I could have shared it with folks.
So - 2024:
First Sandwich terns are around and we had at least 1500 Black-headed gulls at roost this week;
A Magpie over today, has become almost an annual event recently, but otherwise it's been a very slow and quiet early spring with only a few common migrants trickling in.
Hope to see some of you here this year to enjoy the breeding bird spectacle.
Cheers

19/06/2023

Here's a round-up of what has been an exceptional spring on the pond - if you like ducks, and a (slightly) more promising story on the breeding season for terns...

Highlights inc.
LESSER SCAUP - a male on 14 May and 9 June (7th record at SJP)
RING-NECKED DUCK - a male on 2 June (3rd record at SJP)
GREEN-WINGED TEAL - two different males - the second from 6 May - 10 June (6th and 7th records at SJP)
Amazingly there were two days with two American ducks present. The second GREEN-WINGED TEAL was seen with the RING-NECKED DUCK on 2 June and the LESSER SCAUP on 9 June!

Of the 14 species recorded (15 if you count Goldeneyes on the loch which drop in to pool occasionally) five have bred inc. our best ever results for Gadwall - with three pairs having 13 ducklings in total; Shelducks bred for the second time but lost the entire brood apart from one which was found on a track 500 m. away. At least six pairs of Mallard have bred and we await to see how many any of the Teal and Tufties produce...

LONG-TAILED DUCK - a male appears to be summering;
In addition Little grebe made a one day appearance for the first time in 10 years!; Coot have five chicks and Moorhens at least three.

Waterbirds have done very well in what has been the driest spring period recorded to date. Fortunately our new reservoir has kept things flowing nicely.

SANDWICH TERNS have actually increased from eight to at least fourteen pairs - with a few very large chicks soon to be fledged.
Interestingly many of the breeding birds are not adults - which is a first occurrence here. My suspicion is that the populations have been so badly affected by AI that there are huge gaps in the breeding age demographics(?) allowing younger less mature birds in without the competition.

ARCTIC TERNS
Have taken to the new 'beach' really well with the first pair (of 17) producing three chicks and (so far) all three are thriving well. Not sure I've recorded this before?
Total number of pairs: >70 which is very encouraging.

COMMON TERNS
They were also hit by AI last year and although not as devastatingly as Sandwich terns - they've struggled to ten breeding pairs in 2023 - a 50% drop at least.

BLACK-HEADED GULLS
A minimum of 320 nests were counted in May but more birds came in and nested later, so an approximate colony size of 350 wouldn't be far off... but it's a long way off the peak of >750 pairs from 2021. Most nests seem to have three chicks as per the norm - and most seem to fledge - unless the otter gets in. We did have a few nights of chaos when an animal hoovered up stuff I'm sure, but we managed to block an obvious entrance hole in the outflow under the fence.

12/06/2023

“There isn’t a beach in Caithness with all-ability access - and I’ve not actually been on a beach in Caithness in nearly 30 years!”

This was the revelation to me from Mrs Helen Budge, chairperson of the Caithness Disabled Access Panel - with whom I had arranged to meet and discuss the new set up at SJP.

I was shocked - and even more so when I was told that there are so few places (inc. shops and visitor attractions) where there are any kind of acceptable access arrangements. In 2023 how can this be possible?

So, on 20 May, the main feature of the re-opening ceremony of St. John's Pool Bird Reserve focussed on helping redress (to some small degree) this unbelievable situation.

Bringing the wonder of birdlife up close to a seriously marginalised sector of our society is one of the core goals of the ‘SJP 2020 Project’ - and it's now possible to drive right to the main gate with just a short push or 'drive' to the hides - a facility much commented on by the CDAP group.

I spoke for 10 minutes and thanked all the funders and others who'd made the new developments possible. Eilidh Coll who is Community Funds Adviser for Foundation Scotland and helped
secure funding for a large part of the project also gave a short speech highlighting the improvements for birds and visitors alike.

This was a combined event with Caithness Bird Club's 60th anniversary celebrations. As part of the festivities, a delicious iced fruit cake was produced by https://www.facebook.com/stacksdelibakery/ Big thanks to them - it was extremely good!

Wheelchair user Kevin Morrice did the ceremonial honours of cutting the cake with the help of his mum Syd - and the guests, including members of the disabled group, were very appreciative of coffee and teas provided.

Kevin then cut the ribbon to Wader hide and became the first wheelchair user to be able to birdwatch from it. Both he and the other members were fascinated at the level they could access - with their carers - and have such close-up views of the birds and nests. "It was amazing!" said Helen

We hope to see many more all-ability visitors coming to SJP in the near future.

23/05/2023

OPEN! That sounds good.
- It's been a long time coming - but on Wednesday 24 May @ 1000 the gates will be open for visitors.

Post Covid; a 'pause button' on Bird flu (so far this year); and most of the never-ending works completed, it's time to enjoy the spectacle of the breeding season at SJP Bird Reserve.

So what's happened?

The stark facts are:
The SANDWICH TERN colony is only just viable.
Seven pairs are breeding and today or yesterday, the first chick hatched. This is good news but the reality is, if all nests are successful, it represents a mere 7% of peak numbers. Clearly after the 8o adults and chicks died last season, the dying continued all the way to Africa.

COMMON TERNS are down to 25-30% of maximum colony size;
ARCTIC TERN are down on 2022 with numbers holding at 45-50 pairs;
BH GULL colony is around 350 pairs - roughly 50% of maximum.

The effects of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza are still being felt in the UK with serious mortality of some species in particualr areas. The recovery for species like Sandwich terns with