Golden Eagle, Spotted Flycatchers and Alpine Swifts over Lanjaron 29th June 2009

Monday afternoon, and with work finished for the day it's a short walk up the mountain along a now very familiar local track to keep my eye in and check out what's happening "up the road".

I've been watching a pair of Blue Rock Thrush up here for some time now. As ever I had no difficulty in finding the male on one of his favourite boulders, perched happily in the sun. Within no time I was watching a juvenile pestering him for food from the rocks nearby, and with a Spotted Flycatcher showing well a female Golden Oriole passed through, and the afternoon was starting to have a quite a relaxed, easy feel to it. There could be a few nice photos here...

I guess it couldn't last. With a strident, shrill yelp an adult Golden Eagle broke cover from the slope below and everything scattered and disappeared. With Golden Orioles screeching angrily from the trees below me the huge bird of prey began to circle overhead, its fluty "twee-ooo" calls carrying far up the valley.

I walked on for a couple of hundred yards, following the eagle as it patrolled above me, crying persistently as it went. I thought I'd lost it for a brief moment but then, suddenly, a first...I found it perched at the top of an old Chestnut tree, still crying loudly, the first time I've ever seen a Golden Eagle at rest and not on the wing. Of course, it was some distance away...I was probably asking too much of my camera but maybe some of the pictures will make the grade. Watch this space...

I have to say for a moment I thought I'd found a nest-site. I think I've encountered this individual bird before. It's showing full adult plumage but it's demanding, whining tone suggests, to me at least, a juvenile impatiently seeking attention, or perhaps an adult crying out for an absent mate yet to return. Either way, for now it appears this particular Golden Eagle is holding its territory alone.

My attempts to "sneak up" on the bird to get a better shot proved laughable...I'm sure it knew more about my exact whereabouts than I did and as I worked my way closer it inevitably took to the air, circling effortlessly around me, while I fumbled with the video function on my camera. Still, as I kept telling myself as I decided to head for home, I'd had some of the best views of this spectacular species that I'd had for some time, a birding experience you could wait a lifetime for in the UK.

Once again as I made my way downhill Spotted Flycatchers figured significantly...my second of the day, then within a few minutes my third and then a fourth. As a "birder of a certain age" a lot of my milestone sightings are recorded not on a disc or a hard drive or even a memory stick but in the trusty filing cabinet of my mind. I can certainly recall four Spotted Flycatcher moments from years gone by: one in the highlands of Scotland, one in the Forest of Bowland and a couple in mid-Wales...out here I've seen four in one afternoon. Truly, a remarkable place.

I finished off the afternoon with my best views yet of Alpine Swifts...large and powerful looking with pristine white plumage on their throats and chests. Fantastic birdwatching...with the true heat of summer yet to kick in as July starts to unfold I'll have the sightings list for June up as soon as possible. Another month in the Alpujarras begins!....