A new year begins

We were over in England for a week after xmas and including New Year and I had a real birding holiday (or holiday from…) and did not take bins or camera. There were of course birds with Red Kites now everywhere including low over my old school and the local supermarket carpark and a Little Egret in roadside fields which would have been unimaginable when I lived there as a kid (30+ years ago).

We left warm but wet weather in England to return to cold and very icy weather in Norway and have this week had a real dump of snow with around half a meter many places. Next week is forecast to be over zero and rain which will result in lots of flooding possibly. The conditions this week have been far from easy and roads have been absolute chaos (normally Norway copes quite well with winter but the council in Oslo has not been able to clear or salt roads or pavements properly although cycle tracks (with no cyclists..) are nice and clean).

I have of course been out and about around birding in Oslo this past week and notched up a few birds in the snow including an outing with Jack D yesterday when he received his first ever dose of Hawkie and got immediately hooked 😊

Hawkie in the snow

we saw no signs of rodents in the snow but the owl seemed to hear them

we saw this vole stored in a crook of a tree

Jack Snipe (kvartbekkasin) seen in heavy snow on 4 Jan

see all the snow that has setted on it

and from Christmas Eve

Bearded Tits (skjeggmeis)