The Mull 5-day Wildlife Expedition - Guest blog - Heather Pinchien

THE ISLE OF MULL WILDLIFE EXPERIENCE

with Megan McCubbin, Indy Kiemel Greene and Dave Sexton

August 24th – 28th 2026

The group met in Tobermory at 2pm – one of the group had come straight from climbing Ben More!

Tobermory looked a picture in beautiful sunshine and blue skies. Indy and Dave were totally outnumbered with the group being all ladies.

First stop was some lovely Harbour Seals on some rocks in the sound. We stayed in north/mid Mull for the first day. The highlights of day one, were, a wonderful sighting of a White Tailed Eagle flying overhead, who was then joined by one of this year’s young. We also saw a female Hen Harrier and a pod of common dolphins.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Day 2 – Today we headed to the south of the island. We saw a Golden Eagle this morning, a juv. Hen Harrier and a male, which is always a truly special sight. Also WTE and a distant Osprey. There seems to be an influx of passing Osprey, as I saw one in the evening too. We saw a couple of Otters, mother and cub, but they were being very elusive, sleeping behind a rock. Later we saw a dog Otter, unfortunately he had some tubing round his middle, very sad to see this, fortunately a couple of days later we heard he’d freed himself of the marine litter without intervention.

We saw some beautiful black bunnies! Megan found some Sundew and explained to us how it trap insects. We saw a sleepy Barn Owl on the way back to Tobermory – Top spot awarded to Dave for this!

Day 3 – We caught up with some Slow worms, legless lizards, this morning basking in the sun. An Irish ladys tresses Orchid. Saw some good waders including a Greenshank.

Something rather exciting in Dervaig, was the new toilet! A very welcome addition.

Stopped off and had a walk and lunch at Calgary.

Next was Eos Fos waterfall and onto Ulva ferry where we saw a couple of otters, there were a few traffic jams, due to cows!

Caught up with a couple of WTE and an Osprey to finish off the day, before heading back to Tobermory.

Day 4 – Sealife Mull We had a fabulous day today out on the boat. 2 WTE on the way out, at least 3 Minkes, Common Dolphins bow riding, an abundance of sea birds, including lots of Manx Shearwater up close which was very nice to see, lots of diving gannets and a Great Skua. Plus fantastic weather.

A talk after by Mulls very own Professor Plankton – Andy Tait. Unfortunately, not a happy tale, due to huge decline of Plankton over the past 10-15 years. This is where sea life starts, goes to show how much we, as humans need to care for our oceans.

Day 5 – Some of us met another member of the Nature Scotland team – Gordon Buchanan – and his bright trainers!

Our Plans changed as we got reports of an otter family, playing below White Tailed Eagles. We spent a good amount of time with them and we were spoilt for choice! There was a mum and 2 cubs.

We drove on to see 2 more WTE and in the same view were common dolphins.

A great trip was had by all, lots of laughs, of course fantastic wildlife and lovely food, thanks to Jane. Did I mention the weather??? Not a drop of rain and in shorts and t shirt all week (except the boat trip)