An exotic looking fisherman has been hanging around Stromness these last few months but never seems to leave the harbour. This one however can be surprisingly difficult to find. With a little help from a friend, I was pointed in the right direction, albeit for the briefest of introductions.
More accurately I should say fisherwoman, and one graced with a regal name. I am of course talking about a kingfisher, that unmistakeable turquoise flash of lightning more likely to be seen on the slow-moving lowland rivers of England. To see a kingfisher in Orkney is an unusual delight.
These last few winters have actually seen a kingfisher overwinter in Stromness whilst another was spotted in Kirkwall harbour during the August of 2023. Scanning the ropes hanging between the multiple small boats and the piers draws a blank but as we approach the RNLI Lifeboat my friend spots it perched on some rope, framed between the guard rails.
I mentioned this was a fisherwoman and not a fisherman. The lower mandible of this bird is almost entirely a reddy-orange colour meaning it is most likely a female. In breeding pairs, the male has an all-dark bill. The artist Diana Leslie is drawing the town across the harbour on an easel. With her headphones on and engrossed in her art she is oblivious that this dainty little bird is a mere six feet below her.
It’s not there for long however and darts off low across the water landing on a white buoy in the middle of the harbour. To read identification books without looking at a picture you could be forgiven for thinking this bird wasn’t worth looking at with various unflattering descriptions, like ‘Plump’, ‘short-legged’, and ‘a big head with a disproportionately long bill’.
It isn’t much bigger than a house sparrow but what it lacks in stature it makes up for in colour with vivid blue-green upper parts and a bright orange breast and legs. The kingfisher is a rather scarce bird north of the Highland fault line but one thing they have in common with kingfishers throughout the UK is that they suffer badly in harsh waters.
In fact, the change in the range of the kingfisher from the early 1980s to the mid-2000s saw quite a remarkable expansion, perhaps mostly because several severe winters had led to low numbers.
Kingfishers may move to the coast during the winter months, to places exactly like Stromness harbour or to estuaries to counteract harsh conditions, reducing the impact of poor winter weather on their fishing opportunities.
I’ve heard that this bird rather appropriately likes to hang around near the diving boats towards the east of the pier at night. I would love to get an image of it silhouetted by the lights of the harbour twinkling on the water so I return that evening. I draw a blank though, it may well be here but not every bit of rope has light shining on it and it would be easy to miss.
There is however another bird here that will do just as well, many multiples the size of a kingfisher but no less skilful at catching fish; the grey heron. It is resting on a pontoon and I manoeuvre myself until a thin band of reflected light brings the shape of the bird into relief. It doesn’t show the whole bird but the shape is unmistakable, its punky, spiked hair-do and the thin, long feathers towards its chest blowing outwards in the gentle breeze.
My main challenges here are the ill effects of a slow shutter speed and the shimmering light in the water severely confusing my autofocus system. The solution is to rest my telephoto lens in the L shaped section of the hand rail and fire multiple frames - some might have camera shake but some won’t. The other idea is to switch to manual focusing and use the ‘peaking function’, where anything the lens sees as being in focus will be translated as a red colour in my viewfinder. Even then I can see that the band of light is so narrow for the most part I can’t get the entire length of the beak silhouetted.
I’m at the mercy of the elements and fire away in the hope that the highlights will fill the dark space to the tip of the bill whilst I photograph. Given the challenges I faced photographing a very large bird in this way it bothers me less that I didn’t see the kingfisher!
The conditions are good. There is very light or no wind and so, emboldened by my success with the grey heron, I try the same technique on a mute swan on the Peedie Sea on my way home. The difference here is the swan is always slowly moving forward and as a result so am I. This time however I use my tripod which I’ve adapted to hold a fluid video head, and as such it is now a steady platform for even longer, heavier telephoto lenses.
These past weeks have been remarkably settled given it’s still winter time. I recently spotted an otter family, a mother and two cubs, from half a kilometre away such was the stillness of the water, their characteristic tail flick as they dive easy to make out through my binoculars. Over the course of an hour, I watched as they returned to the surface time and again with eels, sticklebacks, flatfish and, somewhat more unusually, a large pollock. It felt like easy viewing and it’s time to savour given how often it’s much more difficult than this.
Nothing lasts forever though and multiple days of strong south easterly winds have brought some big seas to Orkney’s east coast, and I’m excited to see what photographic opportunities it might bring.
I’m less excited when I get out of the car at Newark Bay in Deerness to find that, despite my best efforts, the freezing cold wind has found every gap or chink in my armour. This wind is best described as ‘raw’.
The sea however is magnificent. Every metre between me and the island of Copinsay to the east is a froth, or a breaking roller, or racing towards shore. Occasionally one of these waves is brought to a shuddering halt by the vertical cliffs of the Horse of Copinsay, an imposing lump of rock near Copinsay itself.
Spume left behind on the beach takes on a life of its own, the wind tugging it across the wet sand as if pulled by a string. Remarkably, two small birds are feeding in the maelstrom. I hunker down against a bank of cast kelp and pat myself on the back for having worn welly boots and not walking boots. It allows me to stay where I am as the waves come in and concentrate on photographing the two silver waders making their way towards me. The black beaks, black legs, and subtle grey plumage mean these are sanderling.
The scene is a comical one, the gusts are so strong they are running forward at an angle, almost lifted off their feet, and yet I can see that they are successfully feeding. It is only when the water rushes in quickly and they are unable to maintain their position that they lift off, do a star turn, and land back on the sand, frantically feeding before the next wave comes in. By now they are directly opposite me, a mere six feet away, and I see a nice size comparison as one of the two birds skips over a limpet shell in the sand.
In a moment I’m doing some skipping of my own as I gauge that the wave about to break on the beach was thicker than the last and that it’ll likely flood my welly boots if I stay where I am.
I can see a flock of gulls periodically in the troughs between waves and head further along the beach to get a good angle. I now feel like that sanderling, braced against the wind, the hood of my jacket pulled tight. I shelter against the sand dunes but the problem isn’t so much me as my lens. The 800mm telephoto is long and it feels like it’s being whacked by the gusts every time I raise it to take a picture. The best I can do is to keep firing knowing that the wind will push the frame often far from where I’m trying to photograph.
Then possibly one of my favourite scenes in the whole of the natural world plays out before me. A good-sized flock of long-tailed ducks has risen from the surf and is making its way out to sea. Resplendent in their winter plumage, I see them appear and disappear amongst the rolling waves. This scene only happens in Orkney during east or south-easterly winds and big seas. This is every bit as wild as filming wolves on the Tibetan plateau or forest elephants in the rainforest and I love it.
I can hear their yodelling calls amongst the thunderous crack of the sea and watch as they disappear out of sight. I feel like I’ve taken something of a beating and head back to the car satisfied, and yet there was still a surprise to come. Back in the comfort of my home that evening I scroll through the images as I download them, reliving the moment the ducks started to leave the bay. I can’t quite believe it, there, directly below the group of long-tailed ducks, is an otter.
I was so intent on just keeping something in the frame that I hadn’t picked up the otter at all. Of the images I took it’s in three pictures and then gone. Before I had got in the car I had found the leathery skin of a female lumpsucker fish, a favourite prey of…you’ve guessed it!
With some light left I head west in the hope of a sunset and I’m glad I did. I arrive at the Bay of Skaill as the sun is setting behind the headland of the Hole o’ Row, the geometrics of the black cliffs and shimmering curve of the sun pleasing my eye.
Raymond is a wildlife filmmaker who also offers bespoke Orkney wildlife tours and one-to-one wildlife photography tuition. Find out more via his official website. You can also find him on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.