Some waders not photographed

It’s been a while since I posted but I have been out and about. On Monday I had a productive trip to Østensjøvannet which gave me 2 each of Slavonian and Little Grebe and best of all a Shoveler. Yesterday, Anders and I went to Kurefjorden and got soaked but also had some good birds although my camera never left my backpack. Waders were clearly arriving whilst we were there and we had in total 11 Curlew Sandpipers which I am sure must be a day record for me, 50 Dunlin plus Bar-tailed Godwit, Grey Plover and Knot. Raptors were a target for us but yet again the rarities avoided us but we did have Honey Buzzard, Marsh Harrier, Peregrine, Hobby, Goshawk plus a few Sparrowhawk, Kestrels and Common Buzzards. Two very distant Kestrels perched in a dead tree definitely should have been something rarer!

Today I went out to Oslo’s islands hoping to find my first Curlew Sandpiper which needless to say I didn’t but I did have extremely unsatisfactory views of my first Oslo Little Stint which was keeping company with 3 Ringed Plovers and a Dunlin on a rocky island far from shore…

Common Buzzard (musvåk) at Østenjøvannet 

amd a juvenile Goshawk (hønsehauk) also there

summer plumage Little Grebe (dvergdykker) with Coots (sothøne)

and in flight

still not sure if this is a youngster or an adult in winter plumage

together 

the Shoveler (skjeand)

my trip to the islands also involved lots of dragonflies at the pond on Lindøya. Here a mating pair of Migrant Hawkers / septemberlibelle / aeshna mixta

a close up of the male clasping the head of the female

a male I think

also a make? 

this must be a female egg laying

not the best picture but here a male Common Hawker / starrlibelle / aeshna juncea has taken hold of the male Migrant who is attached to the female (not visible in this picture)

here are all three with the Migrant Hawker pair mating and the head of the Common Hawker in the middle

and the "proof" of my first Oslo Little Stint.... The 3 lefthand birds are Ringed Plovers (sandlo) and then the clearly smaller Little Sint (dvergsnipe) is above a Dunlin (myrsnipe)

and the same birds with the small size of the Little Stint clear to see

a Wheateat (steinskvett) and a Linnet (tornirisk)