Maridalen

After two days of seawatching and many hours of sitting (although I do have a very comfortable chair for seawatching which Mrs Oslo Birder thoughtfully gave me for xmas!) I needed to move my body today so chose to ride up to to Maridalen which I have neglected for the last two days. I cycled up Akerselva where 5 Goldeneye and a pair of Common Sandpipers are evidence that the river is recovering after the accidental poisoning a year and a half ago. At the southern end of Maridalsvannet a grand total of five singing Wood Warblers was the largest number I have ever had here and also a singing Hawfinch. Not much on the water although a 1^st summer Black-throated Diver was something I don’t remember having seen here before (its plumage looks like winter plumage).

The male Wryneck was  perched outside the nest when I arrived to admire him and he then moved to feed and I also heard him sing a few times. Also here a distant singing Cuckoo which is always a scarce Oslo bird, an overflying Yellow Wagtail, singing Icterine Warbler and feeding Garden Warbler – nearly all the summer migrants have returned now!

Wryneck Maridalen

Also today, the garden Great Tits hatched. Click here for pictures.

Now that I have had some time to go through them properly, here are a few more pictures from yesterday's outing.

3 Dotterel

Female Dotterel (left) & male Dotterel (right). Dotterel are one of only a few species of bird where there is role reversal of the sexes. The female is the more colourful sex, chases the males, has multiple mates and the male does the most of the egg brooding and looking after of young.

Reedbed at Hellesjøvannet. Marsh Harriers breed in this reedbed, Hobbies were hunting over it, the Whooper Swan nest can just be seen in the middle and did a Bittern boom here?

Kragtorpvika, Hemnessjøen. Black-headed Gulls and Great Crested Grebes are nesting colonially in the reeds at the back and a flock of 11 Temminsk's Stints were feeding on the mud to the right.

Hous Martin

(Barn) Swallow