Blue Sky? what month is this? and where am I? where are the birds???

not a cloud in the sky... or a bird?



what's this? I see one of each, a Fulmar and a Cloud.

Today was beautiful! a bit nippy as thing go, but not below freezing. Only one Waxwing was seen early this morning at the window, they all have seemed to have taken advantage of the nice weather and the bright moon. Most likely moving on to Shetland to hang out in Lerwick with my Greenfinches. But with their departure I saw new arrivals of a few more Fieldfare and Lapwings. I hope with so many Waxwings still south of Fair Isle to see a few more again before spring. I'm glad to know they didn't go away hungry and fighting the elements. This afternoon not a cloud as I look north. I know most people think Fair Isle's weather is always so bad, but tonight sunset wasn't worth showing because not enough clouds to make it interesting.





The Perfect 10! - The Birthday Boy is full of Joy!

Make a wish!

My son Henry turned 10 years old today. What fun we have had and have yet to come...

I spent almost all day making this cake and getting ready for the party.

The Big 1 "Oh My God" where did the time go!

Waxwings are still here!



To top it off, another amazing sunset... Happy Birthday Henry your 10 years of joy!



Waxwings! I can't stop taking photos!

It's not a classic portrait but, I love this shot for some reason. 

I don't want to be redundant or worse just plane boring, but I can't stop taking Waxwing photos!

 Here are some more I took today.

Punk Birder?

 Honeysuckle, South Lighthouse, House Sparrows and of course a Waxwing

Artsy ain't it?

    inside looking out... 

 

 

  outside looking in, Henry looking out.

 

 

 

 

              I don't know which one I like better?

 

  Eye can see myself

 

 

        and the sunset was even better tonight!  They wont be here forever so enjoy it while you can. Cheers



Sunset Tonight

a few quick snaps of some colour in the Sky

Tonight's Sunset through the bushes along my stone dike. 

and yes those are the 3 waxwings are still feeding in the garden today enjoying the view after a mostly gusty grey day.

Waxwings! Happy Days for HD - Smile for the Birdy

 Smile for the birdy!

Today 6 Waxwings showed up before Henry went off to school about 8:30am. I got more apples from the island's shop (Stackhoull Stores) and fed them all day. It was miserable outside and I really felt sorry for them all morning. After the rain stopped about 1:00pm. the sun peaked through a bit and while she had the chance my wife Liz took some HD Video. So I thought I should take photos of the goings on.

The Waxwings really know how to put on a show. 

I can't wait to see this video of the Waxwings with me in the window photographing them.

*** Exclusive Star Bird Interview ***

I'm ready for my close up... Mr. DeMelle

I'm not really in love with the camera, I just like doing my own stunts.

I'm sort of camera shy

I don't like the spotlight... but I love the chicks.

and they all fed in to the sunset, just look at the apple juice dribbled down the bib.

well, that's all the juicy Fair Isle gossip for now!



Waxwings return this afternoon and stay till dinner.

 Waxwings feeding till dark - Flash Photo

Today while working on my computer I was once again blessed by more than the usual Starlings, House Sparrows or Rock Doves. Yes the Waxwings showed up at the Auld Haa House just out side my window about 2:30pm. feeding on the apple I set out earlier in the day. Lately apples have been dominated by Starlings and Blackbirds and I am happy to put 4 Waxwings on my Year List. Yesterday, out on Meoness I saw a pale grey wader with dark legs. It was among Turnstone, Redshank, Golden Plover... I'm thinking Grey Plover? That would be new for me! I hope to get a better look. I also think this Waxwing Flash Photo is really cool and is unlike any Waxwing photo I have ever seen. It inspired me to post it today before Darts Club.

Working on my computer this afternoon with friends outside. It would of been funnier if I was on twitter.

View from my work station

I was hoping that with all the Waxwings going south, they would stop by again heading back north.

After all the attention of the photos of the Waxwings and Henry it's nice to see them when ever we can...

but, I have to wonder why they keep showing up here in my garden? I put out 4 half apples in 4 different locations around my garden why do they prefer to eat in front of my window leaving some of the others apples untouched? it's beyond me? but I do know when I go out to eat, I always like to eat by the window.

 

cheap too!

Fair Isle Knit Where? for Yarn Market News Magazine

Fair Isle men in a yoal boat - South Harbour - Postcard Sept. 10th 1904

In 2007 I wrote this for the USA knitting industry magazine - Yarn Market News
  

 Fair Isle Knit Where?

When using the words Fair Isle most people think of it as anything knit with a pattern. Fair Isle, is a real place with rich traditions, history, wildlife, some 1200 sheep and about 69 and people call it home as I do now. My wife Liz Musser our son Henry and I moved here from Upstate New York less than a year ago. Shortly after arriving I fixed something around the house with a piece of aluminum ship wreck I had found among the rocks at what I hesitate to call it a beach at the bottom of a cliff, it was then I realized I was starting to flow with the Islands unique creativity and ingenuity. Fair Isle is owned by The National Trust for Scotland the small island is only 1 by 3 miles in size and the only spec of land in a 50 mile shipping lane between the Shetland Islands and the Orkney Island of North Ronaldsay in northern Scotland. Fair Isle is also known for being the most remote inhabited island in the UK.  The Islands defiant cliffs are sculpted by the fierce Atlantic from the west and the treacherous North Sea from the east and totally cut off from the world at times of wild weather.  With no tree in sight, the windswept hills are full of sheep and birds. The lichen covered stone walls divide the croft lands to the very edges of the isle abruptly ending at sky and sea. Crofting and small farming is also on the edge of disappearing all over the world and linked with these traditions are sheep and of course knitting.

People on Fair Isle have always had many jobs and I’ve never heard of anyone being just a knitter. For hundreds of years the islanders would row their small fishing boats out to the passing ships to trade goods such as salted fish, lamb, wool and knitwear. The seamen mostly from Shetland and Scotland had traveled all over the world and new the value of what the Fair Islanders developed. The double knit construction with fine wool yarn made the garments light weight, warm and with unforgettable colors and style. The jumpers and hats became much sought after items, the hardy Shetland men often where hired on to crew scientific explorations to the North and South poles, even up Mount Everest and insisted on Fair Isle knitwear to be ordered as necessary equipment before departing to the ends of the earth.

Me and my 1st Fair Isle Crafts made hat.

Where did the patterns and skills come from? Some say it was the Spanish Armada ship wreck of 1588 or maybe Norse, Celtic or Scandinavian influences. There is even a story of a man gifting kaleidoscopes to the islanders giving early design inspirations to the knitwear. Some or all of these inspirations may have had some influence on the designs but most of the credit should be found in the entrepreneurial creative spirit on the ingenious make do islanders that developed a niche market that seamen couldn’t pass up when sailing by. The two colors of yarn at any one time and the symmetrical patterns set in rows that never repeated just some of well known characteristics of Fair Isle. One of the lesser known traits of Fair Isle is like Scottish kilt tartans each Fair Isle family or knitter even will have their own specific patterns and color combinations. In today’s terms Fair Isle had the Malden Mills Polar-Tec Fleece of the early 1900’s. Fair Isle reached its height when the British Royalty took an interest and started to wear it while golfing. Leading to demands far beyond the Fair Isles product levels, soon Fair Isle was being made in the Shetlands then Scotland and it was faster and cheaper. It lost it’s individuality and history and what most people see to day is what some people call “Faux Isle” and is likely made in China by garment industry designer for large labels with senses of history hardly going back to last spring. History has a way of repeating it self, Malden Mills has the best quality and the originator of polar fleece and bankrupt again from over seas competitors. I would welcome some corporate responsibility back to Fair Isle to help insure the traditions that still endure.

Fair Isle Crafts - Knitwear made on Fair Isle.

 

Where is Fair Isle today? The last of the production hand knitters is 85 and can knit a Fair Isle jumper from memory using no charts or guides having knit more than 1000 fair isle jumpers and is now retired and only knits for her grand kids and family. Her husband is 83 a master hand spinner has just finished making his 100^th spinning wheel most of the wood has come from shipwrecks and wood washed ashore during storms and is not taking anymore orders. I consider this husband and wife to be international treasures. Some islanders continue knitting at home for personal and historic reasons, while other have chosen to make product available to visitors.  Two Guest houses here offer knitting and spinning work shops you might even start by clipping your own wool off an unsuspecting sheep. If it is not made on Fair Isle it’s not Fair Isle, so say the members of the Fair Isle Crafts Coop. The coop is 25 years old and does hand frame knitting in keeping to traditional style, consisting of about 8 women. The older women wish to retire and the younger women find it hard to find time to knit. For example the youngest knitter is 26 she can trace her family history on Fair Isle back though the Viking sagas some 900 years ago. She is an engineer working for the community electricity company, a member of the fire brigade, tends to 42 sheep and a large garden, the first female crew member on the Good Shepherd Ferry Boat, some how she still finds time to knit, All the knitwear is readily bought up by visitors to the island almost as soon as it is made, The production levels low as are the revenues making the knitters coop more like a heritage organization than a business. There is a wonderful small Fair Isle museum that documents the past, and I hope funds are found to renovate a beautiful lighthouse into a arts and craft center in which the true traditions of Fair Isle Knitting can be taught and continued into the future.

Fair Isle Today... or at least a few weeks ago

Fair Isle Crafts Co-op  member Mati King in her knitting studio custom making my Christmas hat.

Well it now 2011... The good news is 114th spinning wheel has been made and no signs off stopping. The bad news... Fair Isle crafts has lost their youngest knitter years ago and now down to a hand full of members and only 2 or 3 that actually produce knitting for sale. The bottom floor of the South Lighthouse remands empty and no investment to continue the Isle's crafting heritage has been made or found. Faux Isle is high style and Fair Isle still doesn't see a penny. Ending on a positive note the Island historian is soon starting a weekly class on hand knitting, teaching the Fair Islanders participants how to knit a classic fisherman's hat.

Please share this post with knitters everywhere!

First of the Year Bird List

Happy New Year!

 Snipe

This is the forth New Years Day that my son Henry and I have made a list of as many bird species we can find on Fair Isle in the 7 hours of daylight. Yes I rang in the new year with Black grouse & Famous Grouse (whisky) til 4am. but still managed to get up at 8:30am. to start the search. I had to because...

My friend Jon Dunn challenged Henry and I to the inaugural New Year's Day Inter-island Challenge.

Fair Isle vs Whalsay, 60 degrees north. It's going to be the smallest, shortest bird race in the world!

The prize? A nice bottle of wine and birdwatching glory!

I had put out plenty of bird seed and scraps from the party the night before. From the windows we quickly spotted the first birds of the new year. (birds listed as we saw them)

1. Starling
2. House Sparrow
3. Turnstone
4. Fieldfare
5. Blackbird
6. Golden Plover
7. Hooded Crow
8. Greylag Goose
9. Curlew
10. Redshank
11. Chaffinch
12. Rock Dove
13. Robin
14. Greenfinch
15. Common Gull                                                                                                                                    Leaving the house we crossed the Walli Burn and searched the South Harbor finding...                                                                                                                                             
16. Rock Pipit
17. Eider Duck
18. Shag
19. Teal
20. Purple Sandpiper
21. Mallard
22. Snipe
23. Black Headed Gull
24. Herring Gull                                                                                                                                  Then down and about the South Lighthouse, Skaden and Muckle Uri Geo we found...                                                                                                                                                    
25. Wigeon
26. Black Guillimot
27. Gannet
28. Heron
29. Razorbill - Strangely I flushed the Razorbill from the near by rocks while looking at the Heron and then it flew out to Sea and out of sight? Twite took flight from the field below Nedder Taft and Snow Bunting feeding at Shirva. 1 Pink Foot with the Greylags in the field between the shop and the Houll called Boini Mire.
30. Twite
31. Snow Buntings

32. Pink Footed  Goose
33. Short Eared Owl - the boy just loves Owls! seen in the Plantation and we wished Jack was here!
34. Woodcock 3 or 4 seen in various places most memorable was the one that flew out of the Obs trees an into the second story window... LOL!  Then seen from the North Lighthouse cliffs tops..
35. Raven
36. Black Headed Gull
37. Fulmar - today only 1? off the north fog horn... no Little Auks, bummer. 
38. Kittiwake - flying near the Chapel
39. Lapwing - Meoness
40. Jacksnipe - Walli Burn & Lower Stonebrek ditch
41. Merlin - seen from my garden sitting on a fence post and flying into the South Harbor just before dark. Curlew underwing...

I couldn't find a Wren, Skylark or Iceland Gull anywhere! I know 41 birds is not much... but not bad for Winter on Fair Isle. It beats our old record of 32 birds quite nicely. I think my better understanding of Gulls & Snipe helps. It is a great way to spend the day with my son and the little bit of compition keeps him motivated. I keep on thinking this is going to be won by one bird, maybe 2 and I had a head start with unchariteristic chaffinch and Greenfinch over wintering that I knew he wouldn't have. Then again I also new Whalsay is bigger has more trees and ponds and some species I wouldn't see here on Fair Isle. The fact the Jon is a much better and more knowageable birder wasn't going to help me at all!  But then again I'm "lucky with birds" and I can sleep happy knowing that 41 birds are just a few more than Jon Dunn saw on Whalsay today! making Henry and I the winners.  Cheers and I need a nap now.

 Jon's Birds (in the order seen on Whalsay): Greylag Goose, Herring Gull, Starling, Shag, Rock Dove, House Sparrow, Hooded Crow, Raven, Goldeneye, Gannet, Cormorant, Great Black-backed Gull, Curlew, Redshank, Teal, Whooper Swan, Lapwing, Wigeon, Kittiwake, Fieldfare, Golden Plover, Turnstone, Common Gull, Rock Pipit, Wren, Blackbird, Red-breasted Merganser, Ringed Plover, Mallard, Black-headed Gull, Eider, Black Guillemot, Tufted Duck, Great Northern Diver, Iceland Gull, Carrion Crow, Snipe.

In total 37 species - 9 that I hadn't seen on Fair Isle, Iceland Gull is a good bird anytime of the year! making our combined total for Shetland on New Years Day. 50

*robin, snipe and snowbunting photos taken recently but not today

Christmas Photos with my new camera

Auld Haa House                                                Rooster Cogburn

Tommy trying out the camera's timer in his new Christmas trousers, boots and hat.

 old boats by the grave yard

 

 The Chapel

"click" on photo to make it bigger                                                                         Window in the Kirk

Thanks Santa for the new pocket Camera! Canon - Power Shot SX210 IS - 14mp - 14 times optical zoom. Photographs taken playing with it on Christmas day.

Christmas Bird List? odd mix of birds eating seeds on Christmas Day... Surprised by 6 Greenfinch and the one strange seed eating Turnstone has turned to 8? a 9th found eaten possible by that Peregrine I saw swooping through again today. Other birds of note. 2 Ravens, 5 hooded crows, Chaffinch, Lapwing, Snow Buntings, etc. a total 22 species seen in or from my garden on Christmas Day. No sign of the Waxwing I saw on the 24th

 Xmas Sunset

                   Christmas tree                     

        

just playing with my new toy on Christmas... Cheers Tommy

Merry Christmas!