Tromsø

I am currently in Tromsø where I am helping Jr settle into her new life as a student at the university here. Tromsø is a great town (to call it a city is rather overdoing it though and who ever came up with the description «Paris of the north» should take some time out from describing things) and we are currently enjoying very warm temperatures although in just a few months it will be all snow, darkness, hopefully northern lights and unavoidably thousands of foreign, mostly asian, tourists seeking these «exotic» delights.

Now though this town which boasts the most northern football team, and now also McDonalds, in the whole, wide, world is full of nervous students about to start a new life, apprehensive parents, and yesterday the whole circus that accompanies professional cycling when the last stage of the Arctic Race of Norway was held here and myself and Jr managed to photobomb the winner interview, it was my birthday afterall🥳

I have only allowed myself a little birding and am only using the bus to get around but there is a lot of potential up here. Prestvannet, a small lake 10 minutes bus journey from downtown is a fantastic place with many breeding, and noisy, Red-throated Divers, a good variety of ducks, a few waders including Spot Red when I was there (and apparently lekking Ruff in May) and both Common and Arctic Terns. Tromsø is on an island and the surrounding fjord obviously has potential. By the airport there are some mudflats and here I had a good collection of waders including (distant) Red-necked Phalarope, Little Stint and Ruff. Turnstone also breed in the area and I look forward to seeing them next spring. There were hundreds of seaducks too far out for my bins to ID so I may have to bring my scope on future visits as there must be the chance for some interesting species.

Downtown is full of breeding gulls with Kittiwakes nesting on window ledges, signs and more recently especially built «hotels» which allows incredibly close contact with these birds and their nests. Common and Herring Gulls are also common urban breeders and I have never seen such a concentration and variety of urban breeding gulls before.

Prestvannet

A Spotted Redshank (sotsnipe)

Red-throated Diver (smålom) with a surprisingly small young. Others were nearly fully grown

This Common Gull (fiskemåke) was ringed here as an adult in August 2018. In Feb 2022 it was in Hull, UK

This bird was ringed here as an adult in August 2010 and has been seen regularly but only in Tromsø

Langnes near the airport where I searched for waders

A young Ruff (brushane)

An Arctic Tern (rødnebbterne) that clearly had young nearby as it was very unhappy with my presence

A Sedge Warbler (sivsanger)

My first Little Stints (dvergsnipe) of the year

Adult and juvenile Redshank (rødstilk)

Oystercatchers (tjeld)

Whilst many young Common Gulls were already fledged this youngster still has a number of weeks before independence

This Meadow Pipit (heipiplerke) was still feeding young

The Kittiwake (krykkje) hotel

I haven’t yet managed to find out any information about this ringing scheme. It doesn’t cease to amaze me that colour ringing schemes can be so hard to work out - surely you only colour ringing schemes can because you want to get reports of observations

The Arctic Race of Norway