Buzzards galore

With nice weather today I thought it was time to head east. A couple of days ago enormous numbers (ca.40,000) of White-fronted Geese passed through southern Sweden and I thought I would see if any had found there was to south eastern Norway. I was in luck and found 6 birds hiding away amongst a couple of thousand Greylag Geese at Kallaksjøen. There were also small numbers of Pink-footed, Barnacle and Canada Geese and quite a few dabbling duck (Mallard, Teal, Wigeon and a single Pintail) so it was all quite birdy. Four Cranes were the largest birds I saw during the day but the standout event of the day was provided by raptors and especially Common Buzzards. Today was clearly THE day of the autumn for Common Buzzards to move (large numbers were seen at a few coastal sites) and I had 91 in total with a maximum of 17 together. I also had 6 Rough-legged Buzzards, 10 Sparrowhawks, 3 Goshawks, 1 Merlin and 1 Peregrine giving me 112 raptors in total which I am sure is a Norwegian day record for me. It was very interesting watching the Buzzards and seeing first a couple starting to thermal and then suddenly they would be joined by other birds as if from nowhere before the larger group would then glide off and start thermalling again.

Four Bearded Tits at Hellesjøvannet were very noisy and flew high a couple of times, I had a Great Grey Shrike and also my first Twite of the autumn so I was quite happy with my day. Driving home though a message came through that offered the chance to make it even better. Andreas Gullberg had found a Red-flanked Bluetail at Fornebu! I was over an hour away and had the afternoon traffic to negotiate but made it Fornebu by 1615. The bird hadn’t been seen since Andreas found it and it took another 45 minutes before I saw it very briefy as it moved through trees tops loosely associating with Blue Tits and Chiffchaffs. It then vanished again before being refound and I then got to hear it calling – not the classic call that is reminiscent of a Pied Fly but a frog like croak which I don’t remember having heard from any of the three birds I have seen on Værøy.

There were no photos from me of the Bluetail and hardly any from the day as I forgot the battery to the bazooka (in the charger at home) and the battery in the superzoom went dry after 10 shots… Lesson learned.

Kallaksjøen is one of very few nature reserves in Norway that receives active management

and it was heaving with birds

familt party of european White-fronted Geese (tundragås)

a juv and adult in flight

male Bearded Tit (skjeggmeis), there were 2 males and 2 females

and a video of the Beardies flying around calling taken with the iphone

In the absence of a photo of today's Red-flanked Bluetail here is one I took earlier (Værøy 2018)