It's snowing birds

It was blizzard conditions today and I guess many people chose to stay at home and do some Facebook Birding. This resulted in two excellent finds. Firstly, a photo of a Russian Dunnock at a garden feeder was bird number 10 for the year and the first seen in the field (although we are still waiting for a birder to actually find and ID one in the field). Even more amazing though was a male Yellow -throated Bunting photographed in a garden only a couple of hours from Oslo. Neither the Norwegian or English name meant anything to me at first and previous European records have apparently all been considered of dubious origin but with everything else turning up this autumn there must be a very good chance that this genuine (and I will be one of the six rare men having to make that decision…).

I only ventured briefly out to see what ducks were on Maridalsvannet and there were even more than yesterday. There were still 5 Scaup along with 3 Tufted (or was it 6 & 2?) and now 30 odd Common Scoter but best of all was a flock of 5 Long-tailed Duck which is only my second record here. What with the snow and long distances all my attempts at photos did not even qualify in the dark smudge record shot category.