OSLO BIRDER: Barred Warbler and Northern Lights

It really did rain a lot yesterday but just before 11pm the cloud cover broke and seeing that there was a very strong forecast for Northern Lights we headed into Maridalen. We arrived just in the nick of time and got to see the most amazing display of colours (although no real “dancing” lights) that I have ever seen. Unfortunately this really intense display was over just a few minutes after we arrived and after that we had to be content with a lot of green in the sky. Earlier in the day my social media feeds had a number of posts about how to best photograph the northern lights so I knew what I needed to do. I had changed the bazooka lens for an 18-55mm and had the tripod with me for long exposures. My initial attempts to capture the display just resulted in black shots and it took an embarrassingly long time for me to realise I had not taken the lens cap off and this cost me capturing the best shots with my camera although I did get some with the phone and on review the iphone 11 shots are far better than from my Canon.

I am generally not happy with the pictures I am taking at the moment and it all follows a very wet outing a couple of weeks ago. In addition to my lens fogging up internally the touch screen stopped working on the camera. I was unable to fix it and after a few days decided to try a factory reset of the camera. Amazingly enough this worked but it also meant that all the other changes I have made to the camera were lost and I don’t think I have quite manged to set them all again yet.

That said though I think I did get some good shots of the night sky and the wonders of a solar storm.

Today in Maridalen yesterday’s rain had resulted in an increase in the water level and all the mid that the various snipe had been using is now under water so that may be the end of that fun. There was also ice on some puddles so we may soon be getting movements of birds pushed off now frozen lakes further north. With blues skies it was very quiet in Maridalen and I gave up quickly and headed for Fornebu. This is not in Oslo so any bird that I see here doesn’t count for #Oslo2024 but good birds are good birds no matter where you see them. Yellow-browed Warbler is still foremost in my thoughts but three Chiffchaffs were the only phylloscs I found and none of them were from east of the Urals (tristis). Three squealing Water Rails and a couple of Little Grebes were the highlights and I didn’t think there would be much more to find but decided to put the scope back in the car and have a walk around the area. I saw a Red Admiral which may well end up being my last butterfly of the year and there were still a few dragonflies on the wing. There are a number of apple and berry trees and remembering that a Barred Warbler was ringed in the area on Saturday I paused to see if there were any birds eating the berries. Initially there was nothing to see but then I saw a movement in a rowan tree, raised my bins and saw a grey bird with a ring on its leg – six days after being ringed and with no sightings since the Barred Warbler was still present! It was very difficult to see and even more difficult to photograph but eventually I did get a couple of photos. I also heard it calling and some very subdued subsong was also I think from it although there were also four Blackcap in the area.

Barred Warbler is a real rarity in these parts with no Oslo records but this is my second at Fornebu after I found one in 2012.