Mute Swan mystery

My last post mentioned Mute (and Whooper) Swans and Lapwings in Maridalen but I realised I never posted about the situation at the end of June. I visited Maridalen on 28 June when we had a few days at home between part I and part II of our summer holidays and had unexpected sightings of both species.

Taking Lapwings first I had an adult with 2 juveniles that were able to fly across the lake and flew from Skjerven to Kirkeby. With a fully grown young seen on 16 June, these two from 28 June and then the three seen on 26 July then we have a minimum of 6 fledged young from 3 broods from in total 6 pairs which is perhaps enough to keep the population stable but hardly enough for it to grow.

adult and 2 fledged young Lapwings (vipe) 28 June

The swan situation is far more intriguing. I had seen a single Mute Swan on Maridalsvannet fairly regularly in May and June but had seen a pair only on 3 May and had seen no sign of nesting. Suddenly on 28 June there was a pair with two tiny young! I have no idea where they nested although had seen the single bird fairly often by Geitøya where they had started nesting last year before being seen off by the Whoopers who took over their nest. I had searched in the telescope to see if there was a swan on the island but never found one. Clearly though they were good at hiding and I have seen no other reports of the family on Maridalsvannet except for on 10^th and then 17^th July when the whole family of four was also reported.

The Whooper Swan pair nested on Dausjøen this year which is where they first nested in Maridalen from 2011 (probably also 2010) until 2013 before then choosing a new site where they nested with great success until 2023 but in 2024 lower water levels made that site no longer suitable and they then chose to take over the Mute Swan nest on Maridalsvannet. This year at Dausjøen they had 3 young on 11 June, were still there on 2 July, and were first reported on Maridalsvannet on 17 July when they had lost one of the young. Maybe an encounter with a predator (fox?) resulted in the loss of a young and them moving the nearly 2km to Maridalsvannet. (last year they moved the opposite direction having nested on Maridalsvannet for the first time and then quickly moving upstream to Dausjøen with the young).

It is perhaps no coincidence that 17 July is also the last date the Mute Swan family was seen as the arrival of the Whooper Swans may have caused a return to the territorial, bullying behaviour that characterises this Whooper Swan pair. Maybe they beat up the Mute Swans and drove off the parents?? This would help explain my sighting today of a single baby Mute Swan on Maridalsvannet. Despite lots of searching I could not see the rest of his family although the Whooper Swan family were very much at home, and out of sight, 2km away. The baby will be just short of 5 weeks old and was barely larger than a male Mallard. Both the parents were colour ringed and a check of ringmerking.no shows that both parents were seen at Holtekilen, Fornebu on 20 July so have clearly abandoned Maridalsvannet. I believe the only theory that supports these sightings is that the Whoopers attacked the Mutes sending them in all directions and killed one of the young and separated the other from its parents. They then abandoned it either because they never managed to find it again or did not dare return due to the Whoopers.

Baby swans and ducks are not fed by their parents but the parents do lead them to food and in the case of swans can stir up the mud or uproot vegetation that the young eat. So, a baby swan (The Ugly Duckling) can survive on its own but will be disadvantaged and I doubt it will have been easy nor will it be easy over the many coming weeks before it can fly especially if the Whoopers discover it and decide it is a rival.

 

30 July. Baby Mute Swan (knoppsvane) around 5 weeks old and all on its own

The colour rings on the parents show that they were indeed the same pair that started nesting last year and were also briefly present in the early spring of 2023. The female (PC79) who was born in 2017 was also present spring 2021 with another mate but were chased off by the Whoopers and her mate was later found dead on the fjord. In 2022 she had found another mate and they also visited Maridalen in the spring before again being chased off and then this new mate was also found dead on the fjord. She didn’t give up though and found her current mate P578 (who was born in 2019 and has not been reported to be in a pair previously) early in 2023 and finally this year she raised young only to abandon them….

Video and pictures from 28 July when young just a few days old and possibly newly hatched

the adults sought me out and were clearly of the bread eating variety

Summer done and dusted

After two days back in what is now a rainy Oslo I feel that I have now completed my bird/butterfly/dragonfly goals for summer ´25 and can now hang up my bins and wait for September and hopefully a trip to Værøy. In the meantime I may no longer be able to procrastinate and finally do some of that decorating that has needed doing for far too many years…

On the bird front I have checked in on the Honey Buzzard nest and the female was sitting high in the nest with the head of a small white young (10 days old?) just visible although I am quite sure she was brooding another.

The Hobby pair did not make themselves known when I visited the nesting area which was also the case the last time I checked at the end of June so I wonder if their breeding has failed but more visits will be necessary to be sure.

In Maridalen, the Whooper Swan pair have two half grown young and have rather surprisingly moved close to 2km from the breeding lake to the Maridalsvannet (last year they moved the other way!). I have not seen the Mute Swan family but they were seen on 17 July still with 2 young which was about 3 weeks after hatching so I hope that they are either good at hiding from me or maybe they have moved down on to Akerselva. Lapwings look to have positively surprised and I saw a single juvenile today but on the 26th three were seen with an adult and must mean that the last brood to hatch (the 3 very small young I saw on 17 June but not since) looked to have made it.

Butterfly wise I cleared up with the three late emerging species that I had yet to see bagged in a morning. There are still a few species that I may see either by chance or with a specific visit out of Oslo but I think I am quite happy with my lot now. I have seen 71 species this year and increased my Norwegian life list to 80 of the 101 species. Of the 21 species I have not seen, 16 are resident species I can hope to see, 3 are vagrants plus 2 that are now extinct and unlikely to return unless reintroduced.

A new species of Dragonfly was at one of my favourite odonta sites in Lillomarka where the cancel has restored a bog. Keeled Skipper (småblålibelle) was not just a new species for me but a new species for Oslo.  I knew, or at least hoped, I would see one as the species had already been discovered a couple of weeks previously. Both males and females have been seen so hopefully the species will establish itself but the open areas of water in the bog are reduced year on year as vegetation takes over and the area seems to have gone over its peak. As it has a 2 year development period we may not know until 2027 if they are here to stay. For example Broad-bellied Chasers (blåbredlibelle) were suddenly very common there in 2023 but have not been seen since even though the species has a 1-2 year development period.

A visit to Svellet revealed a nice area of mud and therefore the possibility of waders without having to take the mosquito patrolled walk out to Årnestangen. There were a few species although nothing too interesting but the autumn’s first Great White Egret was noted from the car along the river just to the north.

Great White Egret (egretthegre)

female Honey Buzzard (vepsevåk) sitting high in the nest due to her sheltering young

Maridalen's Whooper Swan (sangsvane) family

a male Honey Buzzard in Maridalen today. It was clearly looking for wasps nests and flying slowly and at a low altitude. This is almost certainly the same bird I saw in Maridalen last summer and which was seen over a large area but was not "my" breeding male. With luck I will see him more and find out if and where he has his nest.

with a Swift (tårnseiler)

juvenile Lapwing (vipe)

my first ever Keeled Skipper (småblålibelle) - a very smart little dragonfly

it was eating a very distinctive looking bug but I have not yet found out its name

my first Silver-washed Fritillary (keiserkåpe) of the year was butterfly #69 for the year. I later saw Brown and Purple Hairstreaks (slåptorn- and eikestjertvinger) but failed to get photos of them

not new for the year but it is always nice to see a Swallowtail (svalestjert)

Just a little detour

So we are back in Oslo and the travelling part of the summer holiday is over. The drive back from Bodø was broken up this time with a stop at a hotel in Hell, which is by Trondheim Værnes Airport and the name has of course appeared lots in marketing. The hotel was thankfully far from being a hotel from hell although the experience of calling to book a room (online booking when you have a dog inevitably ends up with a message telling you to call them) was indeed an experience from hell.

The the call when eventually answered was answered by someone in an overseas call centre who was clearly reading off a script and initially I thought had to be scam but turned out to just be terrible customer service. I was actually positively surprised when we checked in and they were indeed expecting us and with a smile😅.

At breakfast and after a check of the weather forecast I hatched a plan to add another species of butterfly, and what would be my 80th in Norway, by detouring via Trysil to see Silvery Argus (kileblåvinge). I had assumed this would be a long detour but the Map app suggested it would only be 8 minutes longer so it was a no brainer although still required a good sell in to get Jr on board.

The route took us on wide, straight and empty roads through amazing wilderness in Femund and was a much faster and more enjoyable drive than following the main E6 road. The butterfly was only discovered in Norway in 2006 (although could of course have been present much, much longer) and has only ever been found around Trysil close to the Swedish border. For such a scarce species it was very easy to find and numerous on flower rich road verges. I clearly hadn’t done my homework though as especially the males were much smaller than I had expected. It was a very beautiful butterfly with on the males a broad black border to the turquoise on the upper wing.

Underside of a male Silvery Argus. The Norwegian name - kileblåvinge - comes from the white stripe

A very smart butterfly

The females were noticeably larger and probably also identifiable just from this angle although as with most butterflies everything become easier when you see them from below..

The route from the cabin to Oslo with the suggested route to leave Hell where we spent the night

And via Trysil it was only 8 minutes longer. None of the roads are classified as main routes but were a joy to drive

The apparently quickest (although much longer route) was via Sweden although the time is the same as the initial Norwegian only route so I don't really understand why this was suggested. If one is driving further north to for example Finnmark then a route via Sweden and Finland is definitely quicker but I have not seen it suggested for Bodø before. The E6 route to Bodø has become a lot quicker (and safer) due to improvements between Trondheim and Fauske and there are still long sections that that haven't been finished yet but maybe the Swedes have also been improving their roads?

Goodbye to the Arctic

The holiday is coming to an end. We are now driving the 1200km (or more if we take the scenic route) back to Oslo.

The last week has seen me have additional visits to both Graddis and Sulis.

Sulis has resulted in the same species as before and even more Northern Clouded Yellows with them being the commonest butterfly but my hopes of getting better photos of both them and the Pale Arctic Clouded Yellows were dashed by the fact that they hardly ever landed and if they did land close to me it was all too short and my camera handling skills were lacking (the autofocus is broken so I am doing everything manually..).

I visited Graddis 9 days after my very successful visit and it was almost like I was visiting another locality. Two weeks of blazing sun and long, hot days had clearly been too much for the northern species and I saw none of the 4 goodies I had seen previously. I may have seen an Arctic Ringlet (disaringvinge) but it never stopped flying and my one photo is very unconclusive. Idas Blues were now very common though and this had been absent just 9 days before. One big surprise was finding a Large Heath (myrgulvinge) which is the first ever record for Nordland county. Most of northern Norway has ever been visited by anyone with any interest in butterflies so there are surely lots of surprises out there waiting to be found but Graddis has been visited often enough and Large Heath is an obvious species so I feel sure this was a vagrant wanderer.

I also added a new species of dragonfly to my list with Alpine Emerald (fjellmetallibelle) proving to be fairly easy to find at both Sulis and especially Graddis where surprisingly it has not been recorded before which does perhaps show that even here there is definitely more to be found.

Bird wise there has been little of interest with just a few waders including my first juvenile Ruff and Spotted Redshank of the «autumn» and my first ever Treeceeper at the cabin.

A female Alpine Emerald (fjellmetallibelle) that was laying eggs

Male Purple-edged Copper (purpurgullvinge)

Moorland Clouded Yellow (myrgulvinge) on a Fragrant Orchid (brudespor)

Dewy Ringlet (Fjellringvinge)

The first Large Heath (myrringvinge) recorded in Nordland county

Also my best ever photo of the species I think

Was this an Arctic Ringlet (disaringvinge) or just an Arran Brown (fløyelsringvinge)?

Another Alpine Emerald

Blåmannsisen Glacier from close to the cabin

A male Bluethroat (blåstrupe) with food for young that were already out of the nest

Site for Alpine Emerald and also Azure Hawker (fjellibelle)

Male Northern Clouded Yellows (mjeltgulvinge)

And here a female

Another missed photo

And here a missed photo of a Pale Arctic Clouded Yellow (polargulvinge)

And again…. But there will always be another year and hopefully another camera lens

A trip to Tromsø

We are still in the north enjoying temperatures that are if anything too hot with 30C reached once so far and forecast again later this week. We have also driven to Tromsø which is a full days drive and spent a couple of days sorting out Jr’s apartment which will be her new home as she will be starting university there soon - exciting and scary times!

Birding wise, and including the trip to Tromsø, it appears to be raptor free here with the odd sighting of White-tailed Eagle being it. This points to a bottom year for rodents but one slightly strange thing is that I have come across a fair few broods of Willow Grouse and then often with 8 young. Usually when there are no rodents then ground nesting birds suffer as predators go after them. Trips to Fauske/Klungsett have revealed that the lack of birds is real. Velvet Scoters are almost absent presumably due to a lack of food having caused the moulting flocks to move elsewhere. A pair of Garganey and a few waders have been the only goodies.

The drive up to Tromsø gave me another new butterfly in the form of Chequered Skipper (gulflekksmyger). The species is not that scarce in southern Norway although is absent from the Oslo area but where I saw it is part of an isolated population in the north. Future trips to Tromsø will give me the chance to look for more northern specialities including Dingy Skipper (dvergperlemorvinge).

Bar-tailed Godwits (lappspove) at Klungsett, Fauske

Male Garganey (knekkand) in eclipse

A pair of Arctic Skuas (tyvjo)

A male Willow Grouse (lirype) giving a broke wing distraction display to try to draw me away from its young that I had stumbled upon

And a female

Prestvannet in Tromsø is an incredible urban birding spot with a number of pairs of Red-throated Divers (smålom).

My first ever Chequered Skipper (gulflekksmyger)

Just south of Narvik is Norway’s «national mountain» Stetind