Still in holiday mood

I must admit to still being in summer holiday mood and with additional IKEA unflattening and Jr and Jr Jr to entertain both birding and definitely sitting in front of the PC have taken a (welcome?) back seat. That of course doesn’t mean I haven’t been birding – far from it ;-) Trips to pick mushrooms in Maridalen, the beach at Fornebu and Årnestangen on Saturday morning with Per Christian and today in the early morning have of course given some birds plus butterflies and dragonflies which I am getting increasingly interested in.

The water levels at Årnestangen are quite high and there were no large numbers of waders to see either on Saturday or today. Dunlin are especially scarce with none seen on Sunday and today there were none to start with before 10 eventually appeared (only one adult). There were a few interesting species to find (although I am still to see Curlew Sandpiper or Little Stint this year). On Saturday, we had three adult Grey Plover and today the highlight was a juvenile Black-tailed Godwit which I had hoped to find as there seems to have been a mini influx to Norway the last few days. 2 adult Bar-tailed Godwits, 4 juv Turnstone and an adult Knot (also a late year tick) were also good birds today. Ringed Plovers were the commonest wader with 56 and in total I had 14 species of wader today.

Raptor numbers are starting to build up although no Pallid Harriers have made there way down from the mountains yet. Marsh Harriers have arrived though with at least four different birds: 1(-2) juveniles, a 2cy male, a 3cy+ male and a 2cy+ female. Common Buzzards, Sparrowhawks (3 seen together hunting White Wagtails), Osprey, Peregrine, Hobby and Kestrel completed the list but still no Honey Buzzards.

Passerine migration is only just getting going but today I had a calling flyover Red-throated Pipit which is an early date.

a 2cy+ female Marsh Harrier (sivhauk). The pattern of moult may allow the bird to be more accurately aged as either a 2cy or a 3cy+ but I haven't manged to work it out 

a nice fresh juvenile 

the 2cy male with a Sparrowhawk

same birds. The Marsh Harrier can be aged as a 2cy due to it still have mostly juvenile (brown) secondaries and outer primaries

the juvenile and 2cy+ female interacted

Grey Plovers (tundralo)

Turnstones (steinvender) and Knot (polarsnipe)

the all black legs make this (in my book) a Ruddy Darter (blodrød høstlibelle)

this similar dragonfly with pale hind legs is either a Common Darter (rødbrun høstlibelle) or Vagrant Darter (sørlig høstlibelle) but I don't think the picture allows a certain ID

the yellow inner wings of this small red dragonfly make it easy to ID as a Yellow-winged Darter (gulvinget høstlibelle)

a  mating pair of Black Darters (svart høstlibelle). There are more and more black males to see now

larger dragonflies seem to pose far less readily but I did managed to photo and subsequently ID this Southern Hawker (bågrønn øyenstikker)

mating pair of Common Blues (tiriltungeblåvinge)

High Brown Fritillary (adippeperlemoringe) 

Lesser Marbled Fritillary (engperlemorvinge)

Queen of Spain Fritillary (sølvkåpe)

Silver-washed Fritillary (keiserkåpe)

Large Marsh Grasshopper (sumpgresshopper)