August update

Our summer holidays usually include a week or two spent at our cabin near Bodø, north of the Arctic Circle but with growing kids it appears that is no longer something the whole family wants to do. I always love out time there so miss this greatly but we did have chance to visit the cabin this year if only for a couple of hours when we went to Bodø for a wedding last weekend. I had a quick check of my favourite bird and butterfly locations and found next to nothing especially on the butterfly front which made it a bit easier to accept not having spent longer there this year.

Around Oslo it has been very variable weather with a few hours of sunshine and then thunderstorms and very heavy rain. This has made searching for bugs difficult and if continues like this then I imagine a lot of species will have a bad season. I have however seen one of my favourite butterflies and probably the last species I will see this year – Brown Hairstreak.

On the bird front raptors are becoming more obvious in Maridalen and I have had quite a few sightings of Honey Buzzards and Ospreys. There have also been concentrations of divers on the lake with up to 7 Red-throated and 11 Black-throated. All are adults and while the Red-throated are fishing and taking the fish back to their breeding pools in the forest where young are waiting the Black-throated have no young and are clearly a concentration of failed/non breeders. There has not been successful breeding on Maridalsvannet this year with water levels have varied too much and I imagine the same has happened on many of the larger lakes in the area. Red-throated Divers probably experience less variation in water levels on the small forest pools they choose.

Brown Hairstreak (slåpetornstjertvinge)

and another individual. Both these are males

these 3 Ospreys (fiskeørn) were flying together and making a lot of noise in Maridalen. I thought at first they must be a family despite it being an early date for fledged young but as the next photo shows they are all adults

the 3 different birds. All are adults and I think all are males (but am unsure). Perhaps they are young birds that have not yet established a territory or mate or perhaps failed breeders.

all my views of Honey Buzzards were at long range but Maridalen's breeding pair of Buzzards (musvåk) showed well one day although it is a while since I have seen them. I do not know if they have raised any young this year but they were making a lot of noise flying over their nesting area and one was even carrying nesting material. I have no idea what this means.

11 Black-throated Divers (storlom)

the last Lapwings (vipe) an adult Female and a juvenile were in Maridalen until 2 August but seem to have migrated now

an attempt at photography - a daisybird

there are still a few juvenile Red-backed Shrikes (tornskate) but the family groups have broken up and the adult males moved off

dragonflies are tricky. I revisited the sight where I found the Bog Hawker (torvmoselibelle) and saw what I thought were three male but going through my pictures found that a Moorland Hawker (starrlibelle) had also sneaked in amongst them. Bog above and Moorland below

and here a much better picture of a Bog Hawker

the largest pool in the dragonfly bog

a picture from where our cabin is showing the distant Blåmannsisen glacier close to the Swedish border. The ice free areas seem to grow every year (without me having done any proper analysis)