NSKF meeting final day

We tried again for owls on Saturday night but yet again returned home without having heard a thing (excluding possible  hoots at the limits of our hearing!). We did though have close nightime encounters with 4 moose right by the road.

On the drive back to Oslo we had a couple of Great Grey Shrikes, a Peregrine and 2 Ring Ouzels before we took a small detour to the Hamar area where I visited Starene and Åkersvika for the first time. Starene in particular was a fantastic place - a flooded area of farmland that attracts large numbers of birds. Over 300 Pink-footed Geese had 3 Bean, 1 White-fronted and 30 Barnacle Geese amongst them. A couple of hundred Teal and Mallard had 3 (2 male) Garganey, 3 Pintail and a few Wigeon amongst their midst. A small flock of Twite flew around, amongst Lapwing was a Green Sandpiper and 4 Snipe flew over. A female Peregrine frequently put all the birds up and a Rough-legged Buzzard flew over. Quite a magical experience made perhaps even more special as it was snowing! It had begun to snow at the cabin and fell very heavily as we drove to Elverum although cleared up in the afternoon. This was quite a contract to Thursday and Friday when my face was sunburnt!

We also popped into Åkersivka but had little time here. The water was very low and exposed large mudflats which will certainly hold lots of waders in May. Yesterday though was just a handful of Oystercatcher and best of all a Bar-tailed Godwit.

Cranes feeding with Finnskogen and snow clouds behind

Starene with goose flock coming into land