I've just spent a week (28/8-4/9) on Mull with my wife (who enjoys watching some birds but has no enthusiasm for spending hours hunting them out) staying in a self catering cottage on Treshnish point (which I would thoroughly to anyone enjoys wildlife or just peace and quiet http://www.treshnish.co.uk/haunn.html).
I had a good feeling about the trip when a peregrine circle over the car whilst stopped at traffic lights in the centre of Glasgow on the way there (only one of the trip surprisingly). The ferry crossing was, perhaps, a little dissapointing although gannets are always a great sight and I've never seen a kestrel at sea before. The first port of call after ariving at Craignure on the ferry was a nearby spot I'd been recommended for sea-eagle (I don't think this site is any sort of secret but I won't mention it just to be safe). I reckoned on having only a minute or 2 longer than it takes to drink a mug of tea to find eagles before the wife got impatient to find our cottage but I had no such worries with 2 adult eagles appearing and feeding on some rocks after just a sip or 2. They were some distance away but gave great views through the scope and to me seemed even more impressively big on the ground than in flight. Also at the same site were huge flocks of gulls (mainly kittiwakes) and a great northern diver.
The drive to the cottage along the main coast road provided another sea-eagle only about half a mile from the ferry terminal along with an amazing density of herons, plenty of buzzards, hooded crows and eiders, the only sparrowhawk (just outside Tobermory) and little grebes of the trip and a couple of flocks of grey-lag geese amongst plenty of variety..
Next morning I headed down to the sea near the cottage and in between serious soakings from wind-assisted heavy showers had great up close views of gannets and fulmars along with a good selection of gulls (though nothing unusual), guillemots, shags, cormarants, manx shearwaters and a solitary great skua. There were also a few cliff dwelling pigeons which must surely be a good bet for genuine rock doves in a place like that. Just onshore a couple of hoodies proved to be just as aggressive towards raptors as their carrion counterparts in England flushing a female merlin out of the heather.
On further expeditions on Treshnish point I found oystercatcher, swallows, sand and house martins, meadow pipit, grey and pied wagtail, wren, dunnock, robin, stonechat, whinchat, wheatear, blue tit, starling, house sparrow, chaffinch, and large flocks of twite and goldfinch also ever present were several ravens making the most of the winds having a great time. The highlight though was sitting down for lunch on a walk hoping that the otters we had just seen would return and seeing 5 species of raptor from the same spot in about half an hour: kestrel, buzzard, merlin, hen harrier and fabulous views of a golden eagle. I've seen golden eagles before but never close, wow!
It wasn't just birds on the point either. Together with the otters we saw, grey seals, red deer, mountain hares and, for me the highlight of the trip, a group (any suggestions on the correct collective noun?) of about 10 basking sharks just a few metres offshore.
On other parts of the island I saw my first fieldfares of the season and the first time I've ever had really good views of rock pipits hence convincing me that most of the others I've thought I've seen were meadow pipits; totally different birds and I finally caught up with arctic skuas, chasing kittiwakes on the return ferry trip.
I also had my first flirtations with digiscoping on the trip opf which the attached twite and basking sharks were the only decentish efforts.
In general Mull is every bit as great as everyone's always told me.
Michael
Sounds like a great trip Dawsy. I had a day on Mull in July and had terrific views of the Sea Eagles (I suspect at the same place you did). The sheer numbers of small birds was particularly impressive, with fields full of finches, chats, pipits etc.
Just back from a week on Mull. Will post a trip report shortly. We didn't see sea eagles at the site I think you were at, but further inland. Want to shout to the world that we saw one on a spit of land in a loch for 20 mins. - looked like a bear. Also good soaring views in the nearby mountainous area.