The Dale continues to deliver

This week has not only been about reminiscing about the weekend and I have been out in the Dale although with lots of rain my visits have been short. There has still been lots to see though. The Three-toed Woodpeckers seem to have failed with their breeding as a 70 minute vigil at the nest hole on Wednesday failed to reveal any birds however a female (must have been the unpaired one toe) was drumming on Friday at the initial site. Also yesterday I watched a pair of Lesser Spotted Woodpeckers at their nest hole feeding noisy young with the adults coming as often as every 10 minutes. Icterine, Wood & Marsh Warblers and Common Rosefinches are still singing and after seeing a lone female earlier in the week I had the rare honour of hearing a male Red-backed Shrike singing today. I have previously noted that I have only heard Red-backed Shrike sing once before and it was very interesting to hear it today. It sang a lot but the song was very quiet and was almost drowned out by other species which were much further away. I also noticed a lot of mimicry with it copying Willow Warbler, Redwing and Wren.

On Tuesday I had Honey Buzzard which I picked up on call and reckon I have an idea where they might be breeding which will warrant a proper search at some time.

a pair of Black-throated Divers (storlom) showed well on Maridalsvannet and have presumably been flooded out due to changing water levels

this bird was preening its underparts and was rowing along with the upper leg

adult male Common Rosefinch (rosenfink)

female Goldeneye (kvinand)

and here with three of her young

female Lesser Spotted Woodpecker (dvergspett) with a mouth full of food

one of the youngsters

the male

the singing male Red-backed Shrike (tornskate)

and a lone female at another site

female Three-toed Woodpecker. Although I never saw the right foot I am sure this is one toe

even though the Whooper Swans (sangsvane) have failed with their breeding attempt this year they are still present and will presumably stay in the valley whilst they moult

this male Pintail (stjertand) was a surprise on Akerselva, the river which runs out of Maridalsvannet

I picked this Honey Buzzard (vepsevåk) up on call although it took me a couple of minutes to see it

Green Hairstreak (grønnstjertvinge) 

Pearl  Bordered Fritillary (rødflekketperlemorvinge)

by far the most common butterfly in Norway so far this year is the migrant Painted Lady (tistelsommerfugl) which has arrived in the millions. They are all over the place and I even had the at 1400m in the mountains

and some dodgy hand held bazooka vidoes

and the barely audible (and drowned out) singing Red-backed Shrike who makes an amazing variety of noises including lots of mimicking