An attempt at a seawatch

It has been commented that I moan about the weather nearly as much as I write about birds and that is no doubt correct and to prove it – the weather is just wrong at the moment! +12C night and day, southerly winds, overcast and drizzle and not a good, out of season bird to show for it…I’m hoping for Pallid Swift, Hoopoe, Desert Wheatear or at the absolute minimum a Firecrest…

I’m not sure if out of desperation or a real expectation that there would be something good but I found myself sea gazing at Krokstrand yesterday. The site of many a good seawatch a decade or more ago it now serves as a reminder of how autumn weather patterns and arrivals of seabirds have changed. For the nostalgia value it was good to be there and remember previous visits with skuas of all 4 species, Brunnich’s Guillemot, Sabines Gull, Grey Phalarope and all the more expected but still for these parts unusual stuff. Yesterday wasn’t a disaster and there were birds and not just sea to gaze at but it was not a day that will be remembered in a week’s time let alone a decade’s time. Three Kittiwakes were the best of the bunch and there were double digit numbers of Guillemots along with three each of Razorbill and Little Auk but I could just as easily have seen the auks in Oslo.

A nocturnal visit into Maridalen with the thermal imager revealed unsurprisingly that Woodcock are still around with 4 seen along a short stretch. Slightly more unusual was a single Common Snipe and two Fieldfares that were seemingly roosting on the ground in a stubble field. Nearby at least 20 Magpies were roosting together in some isolated bushes. A Tawny Owl called but I picked up no other owls hunting over the stubble fields despite there seeming to be increasing numbers of mice.

Krokstrand looking south towards more open sea

and looking north towards Oslo and the end of the fjord

Woodcock (rugde) taken just with the aid of my head torch

and here using the camera's inbuilt flash. Note how far up the mud goes on the birds long beak showing quite how deep it has been probing for worms

a Fieldfare (gråtrost) one of two which I believe were roosting on the ground rather than nocturnal feeding

and a Common Snipe (enkeltbekkasin)

an unusually easy to observe Little Grebe (dvergdykker) on the park lake at Valle Hovin. In Norway it is unusual to see one so well