Watching for a bird of kings

South Uist: Everything white catches my eye - distant gulls, the flash of a wader's belly - but there's no sign of the gyrfalcon

There have been several reports of a gyrfalcon on the island. A resident of the far north and the largest of the falcons, it's a rare winter vagrant to the UK with only a few being recorded each year " and a bird I'd dearly like to see. It's a couple of days now since there has been word of it, but this morning is the first opportunity I've had to go and look for it and there's always a chance that it might reappear.

So special and so valuable were these birds held to be in medieval times that flying one was the preserve of kings and they were sometimes given as gifts from one royal house to another. There are even recorded instances of gyrfalcons being demanded as part of the ransom for captured royalty. Most prized of all was the white gyrfalcon and it is one of these that has turned up locally.