Country diary: Shetland

As soon as I turn off the engine the curlew is away and running. I'd never have found the nest, never even have suspected it was there, if the bird had sat tight. But that's not the curlew's way. Usually the picture of elegance, with head held high and precise step, the sight of a furtively scuttling curlew usually indicates there's a nest not too far away. I fix my eyes on the place from where the bird appeared to rise and step cautiously forward, checking carefully before planting each foot on the ground. I find the eggs in a little hollow of browned grass up against a dried-out clump of sphagnum moss and overhung by soft rush. There are just three of the noticeably pear-shaped eggs rather than the curlew's more usual four. Olive-green and patterned with brown, they are beautifully camouflaged among the grass and the shadows of the rush stems. Carefully I touch the back of a finger to their smoothness and feel the warmth imparted to them by the incubating bird. I snatch a couple of quick photographs: one of the eggs and another of the nest site to show its proximity to the single-track road. It is within feet of a frequently used passing place; I wonder if the bird moves off each time a car draws in or if it was only the silencing of the engine that caused her alarm. The curlew hasn't gone far, I catch glimpses of her pacing back and forth just over the crest of the rise, and by the time I'm halfway down the slope to the rocky foreshore she'll be back on her eggs. Returning by way of the road an hour later, I approach the car as quietly as possible in the hope of avoiding further disturbance. But the bird is incredibly wary, and I'm still some distance away when her head pops up like a periscope from a sea of grass and she's off again.