Rain at last

The long awaited and anticipated change in the weather came this morning but the hoped for enormous arrival of new birds did not materialise. Perhaps temperatures that did not rise above 5C were to blame or maybe it was the wrong type of rain but the rain must be positive for the coming days. There was one noticeable arrival of birds though with Meadow Pipits finally being numerous and there were over 100 on the fields at Kirkeby, Maridalen but I coud find nothing more interesting amongst them.

I made my first trip of the spring to Nordre Øyeren but even here there was no sign of any new birds. Svellet is mostly bone dry but even the few wet areas held no birds. The only waders I could find were in Snekkervika where at long range I noted 22 Curlew, 12 Oystercatcher, 9 Greenshank and best of all a male Ruff. Merkja looked good but a couple of hundred Teal and 2 Green Sandpipers were it. Along the river in Lillestrøm I had my first Common Tern but there were no hirundines.

Ever the optimist, I am sure that it is tomorrow that all hell will break loose…..

These pictures of an Osprey are from Maridalen on Saturday

Osprey (fiskeørn)

the clean white underwing coverts show this not to be the bird I photographed 12 April. Such white coverts should make this bird a male but the breast band is rather well marked so I am not sure about this individual