Honey Buzzards

This is the third of my posts on scarce breeding birds from summer 2021.

I was very privileged to be informed of a Honey Buzzard nest in Oslo last summer. I was told about its existence early in the season but had to wait until the young were close to fledging before I would be shown the nest. Needless to say I got quite impatient and was really looking forward to the day. The nest location really surprised me in that it was much closer to the city than I had expected and right over a path (albeit little used). The species is very secretive during the breeding season and I had always assumed that nests would be in quite inaccessible areas of the forest but I clearly need to reappraise that assumption and as we all know assumption is the mother of all..https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSIOE0MsUnU

I visited the nest 9 times and spent in total 13 hours with the birds over the course of 12 days. There was only a single youngster (I do not know if there had been another that had died) which was already well grown when I first visited. There is little activity at a Honey Buzzard nest once the young are so well grown. Prior to my first visit the female had apparently always been close to the nest but once the youngster was large enough she also left the nest to bring food.

I witnessed three deliveries of food, two from the male and one from the female and incredibly enough witnessed what seemed to be the first flight of the youngster as it left the nest never to be seen again. Most of the time the youngster was just standing on the nest although towards the end of the period he was also clambering around on branches in the tree.

Here are a series of videos I took. First is a longer video (9 minutes) and then a series of short clips that I have previously posted on Twitter.

11 days before fledging

9 days before fledging

9 days before fledging

7 days before fledging

5 days before fledging

perching away from the nest 4 days before it left

feeding on wasp comb 4 days before fledging

still 4 days before fledging

the day of fledging perched quite a way from nest

back by nest shortly before it flew off

after the youngster had left the nest I explored the area immediately under the nest tree

discarded wasp comb

a lost (tail?) feather from an adult