Today dawned with thick fog again as a result, I believe, of
no wind, warm sunny afternoons and cold nights with a lot of moisture in the
soil.
From tomorrow though there is quite a bit of wind forecast so
hopefully fog will no longer be a problem.
I had little time for birding today but squeezed in a trip
to Maridalen after breakfast where the fog made viewing conditions nearly
impossible. Redwings and Chaffinches were singing everywhere though and I had
my first singing Dunnock of the year plus second singing Chiffchaff.
Things got a bit more exciting in the afternoon though when
I checked my emails whilst making dinner. I had received an email from a
stranger who had just seen a Kingfisher along Akerselva (the stream running
through Oslo) and only a five-minute cycle from my house. I alerted Per
Christian who lives even closer and we met after dinner at the river. Quite
amazingly we found the bird in the same area as it had been seen earlier
although saw it only briefly before it took off upstream. The river here could
conceivably house a breeding pair as there are slow moving sections and small
fish but I could not see any suitable mud/sand banks for a safe nest hole. The
bird I saw was a female and there was nothing in its behaviour to suggest it
was in breeding modus but it was best to be cautious with such a popular
species (nearly as popular as a Great Grey Owl).
I searched again for the bird on 5.4 without finding it
although was lucky enough to have a male Lesser Spotted Woodpecker.
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| Kingfisher (isfugl) in urban Oslo on Akerselva. The extensive red on the bill shows it to be a female |
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| Grey Wagtail (vintererle) pair |
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| a male Lesser Spotted Woodpecker (dvergspett) was a nice compensation for not refinding the Kingfisher |
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