At high tide at Shellness, which usually falls in the middle few hours of the day, a peregrine often runs in to try to take a dunlin or ringed plover. The start is marked by the sudden rush away of the dunlin flock. The oystercatchers gathered on the ness and curlews in the saltmarsh all get get up but return quite quickly. The dunlins and grey plover pirouette in the sky and the peregrine latches on to one poor bird and the chase ensues. The problem is that it is all a mad dash and for a 30 seconds or so chaos reigns; trying to capture it on film is nigh on hopeless because it is such a fast moving drama.

Here are some from the most recent attempt on a balmy spring day; the action is all a bit distant and hazy but it captures the desperate dunlin and relentless falcon. I never saw the outcome.

The nesting ringed plovers were unfazed. Male shelducks were being macho on the beach and oystercatchers were running round in noisy display flights with wings held up.