Clatto Country Park is a great place to spot wildlife. At this time of year look out for colourful jays in the woods as they busily collect nuts to store for the winter. They are shy birds and hard to approach close.
Autumn leaves on swirling wind, dipping and rising on puppeteer strings, before finally cascading to the ground in a final farewell to mark the season’s rapidly approaching end.
I was in Clatto Country Park by the edge of Dundee where the wonder of autumn simply shone out at me, such was the blaze of fiery colour from the beeches, oaks and other trees. A stand of geans – or wild cherries as they are also known – caught the sun in a most stunning way, with their burnished leaves displaying a palette that shaded from orange to crimson.
Beech leaves, too, carpeted the ground in coppery flakes, a bronzed and crispy carpet that rustled gently under the fall of my footsteps. This autumnal colour is all down to the leaves shutting-up shop and finishing their food manufacturing function, with the green-coloured chlorophyll having broken down, thus enabling yellow and orange leaf pigments to predominate.
But autumn is not just about colour, there is also the smell, the heavy dampness in the air and the nip of coldness which in a few weeks’ time will be very much more severe. This is such a special time of year.
Out on Clatto Reservoir, there were plenty of other signs of autumn with good numbers of waterfowl congregating on the water. A whooper swan caught my eye, so elegant as it glided across the water. It was hard to imagine that only a few weeks before this bird had been in Iceland, having spent the breeding season on some remote lake – an environment so very different from the outskirts of Dundee.
As I watched the swan, memories flooded into my mind of previous encounters with whoopers, especially the excitement of watching an incoming flight of several birds; long necks extended, the synchronised determined wing beats digging deep into the cold winter air in an inspiring display of power and grace wrapped-up in a shimmering cloak of white.
It’s the sound that enthrals, the air ringing from their bugling ‘whoop, whoop’ calls and the rhythmic swish from their powerful wings. And then there is the landing; descending down upon the water’s surface in a trail of white spume as they majestically come to rest.
Wonderful reflections of wonderful birds, but the cold wind soon brought my consciousness back into focus, so I scrutinised the reservoir once more to see what else was about. There were tufted ducks, mallards, coots and moorhens out on the water, as well as goosanders and a lone cormorant. It was an eclectic mix, and it was good to see so much wildness only a few miles from the bustling centre of Dundee.
After completing a circuit of the reservoir, I headed into the nearby Templeton Woods where high in the pine canopy, the tinkling calls of a flock siskins drifted down; nature’s sweet music providing the perfect accompaniment to the calm serenity of the wood.
