Look at the birds, free and unfettered, not tied down to a job description, careless in the care of God. And you count far more to him than birds. Matt 6.26
As I walked the West Highland Way I encountered many birds along the trail; almost ever present Chaffinches (in isolated parts, willing to risk taking crumbs from my hands), Bramblings, Buzzards, Crows, Hooded Crows, Rooks, Magpies, Greylag Geese, Lapwings nesting on the moors, inquisitive and watchful Robins, Blue Tits, Great Tits, Coal Tits, Goldfinches, Siskins, Tree Sparrows, Greenfinches, Goldcrests, Willow Warblers, Wood Warblers, Meadow Pipits, Collared Doves, House Martins, Pied Wagtails, Wrens, Thrushes, Blackbirds, Starlings, dogfighting Swallows machine-gunning one another with short staccato bursts of sound, Herring Gulls, Common Gulls, Oystercatchers, Curlews, Mallard Ducks, and Pheasants.
But there were also some real treats for me; breeding Shoveller Ducks on the moor near Loch Lomond, the daily sound of Cuckoos and a sighting of one calling on the edge of a plantation on my last day as I walked from Kinlochleven to Fort William (these guys are amazing, having left the jungles of Congo barely 6 weeks ago - they are busy raising the next generation in the wilds of Scotland before flying back to the warmth of Africa in just a months time! See http://www.bto.org/science/migration/tracking-studies/cuckoo-tracking for more about their amazing journeys), a Canada Goose with a dozen tiny goslings in tow on Loch Lomond, the ‘chat, chat’ call of Whinchat in the woods and Stonechat on the moors, not just one but 6 Dippers (usually a shy bird and not easy to see) along a single river one morning, the joyful sound of Common Sandpipers on a remote highland river bank, and surprised Dunlin breeding on an otherwise deserted mountainside.
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