Seawatching snaps

Here are some pictures from yesterday. The bad light and rain are very evident.....

Grey Phalarope (polarsvømmesnipe) - at least I got a picture of sorts

possibly a bit better?

Black-headed Gull (hettemåke) and Little Gull (dvergmåke) - the smaller size, white upperwing and black underwing of the Litte Gull are obvious here

a 1cy Pomarine Skua (polarjo) - this bird shot past with another individual and stopped to chase a Herring Gull

8 Poms from a group of 10

goup of 7 Poms - this group had hung around for over an hour before shooting off north

Velvet Scoter (sjøorre)

Shearwaters, what Shearwaters?

The strongest southerly winds of the autumn (sonfar) were forecast in the outer Oslofjord so seawatching was on the cards again today. And indeed there were many birds out there. Reports came in of thousands of Fulmars (havhest), Great (storlire), Cory's (gulnebblire) and multiple Sooty's Shearwaters (grålire) but that was all happening 60km south of where I was sat. I was not able to start early today and chose Krokstrand which is further north than Brentetangen and while maybe having fewer birds does offer much closer views. On the way down a message came through from Bjørn Olav that he was there already and had seen a Grey Phalarope (polarsvømmesnipe).....a very promising sign!
I was there 20 minutes later and the bird was not visible but was presumed to be on the sea. It took an hour before the bird showed again flying a few hundred metres before pitching down onto the sea. We saw it a couple of times again over the next two hours but it was not easy keeping track of it once it was sat on the sea as the waves were too high.
Other than this fine bird though, 4 hours of sea gazing produced only one Fulmar, 200 or so Guillemots (lomvi) heading north and a single Arctic Tern (rødnebbterne). Clearly the winds were not strong enough to force north all the interesting petrels and shearwaters being seen off Ravn and Hvaler.

Pomtastic

The winds were just right today and there was little rain forecast and temperatures were around 5C. In other words prefect for yet another seawatch (and probably the last of the year). I wasn't able to get out to Rolftstangen, Fornebu until 11am by which time I had received a message of a Pomarine Skua there. Fortunately it was still visible when I arrived and remained so until 3pm when I left. It had killed a Common Gull which it regularly returned to feed on just 20m away from where we were standing and gave outstanding views - very exciting stuff. The bird was definitely immature although I am not sure whether it was juvenile (1K) as it had noticeably longer central tail feathers which may be a sign of it being a year older. We also had another Pom Skua at some distance which brought down a gull (possibly a Herring Gull) which it sat on and appeared to succesfully kill and then feed on.
Otherwise there were very good numbers of Kittiwakes with at least 50 and many coming very close and also at least 10 Fulmars which also frequently gave excellent views. I have still to take a decent picture of a Fulmar and today was no exception. I got frame filling views but could not get the exposure right - something to keep practicing. One Fulmar was also noticeably dark but would probably be classified as an intermediate morph rather than a dark morph.
Few auks to see although we did have Razorbill, Guillemot and Little Auk. No Black-headed Gulls and very few Common Gulls remaining but a single immature Little Gull was a nice find.
Rarest bird of the day (although not highlight which definitely belongs to the Pom Skua) was a Grey Phalarope which I saw but unfortunately so briefly that my 2 fellow observers did not get on to it. The bird was in flight on the Bygdøy side of the fjord at Huk and landed which was when I lost it. The identification as a phalarope was easy enough but the specific identification as Grey was based on time of the year (Red-necked's being unheard of so late).
Later in the day a probable Leach's Petrel was also called by another observer but was lost from view. This is the only seabird that I have missed in the Oslo fjord this autumn and it now feels like I have run out of opportunities but I can be happy with everything else I've seen.

Pomarine Skua

Pomarine Skua with Common Gull - lunch!

A very short video of the skua tucking into lunch. You can see it having to flap its wings to deal with the wind.

Fulmar without the colours

Fulmar not quite in focus

Adult Kittiwake

Less sea to see and more birds to see

I definitely deserve points (birds) for trying and today I got some reward. After heavy overnight winds I was on station at Krokstrand at 0845 just 15 minutes after it became light to see anything. Winds were still moderate and the light and viewing conditions were excellent so I felt that yes this could be a good day. Auks were immediately obvious with Little Auks and undetermined Guillemots/Razorbills heading in both directions but mostly south.
The first really good bird took only 10 minutes to get itself in the notebook. A young skua was picked up going south on the other side of the fjord but slowly made its way towards my side and sat on the sea a few times. It was a dark, almost black bird with nice double whhite flashes on the underwing, a barrel chest and strong two-toned bill - in other words a dark phase 1K Pomarine Skua. Whilst watching this I also noted Fulmar and Kittiwake. Things then calmed down for a bit but there was always good numbers of Little Auks and especially Common Gulls moving south. The next bit of excitment came in the form of a 1K Little Gull making its way slowly south and then not long after this came the absolute highlight but also most frustrating bird of the day. I always start my scan looking at the closest shore before scanning to the left over the water and on this scan I picked up a Grey Phalarope at less than 100m range. I immediately saw what I needed to confirm the ID with the thick bill confirming it wasn't Red-necked (however small the liklihood of that would be so late in the year) and then decided to run to the end of the small breakwater with camera raised in the hope of getting a fantastic point blank picture. Well 15 seconds later I was in place but where was the bird? I just couldn't locate it. I assume it had landed as it had been flying slowly but I couldn't see it. How frustrating!! (45 minutes later Ketil Knudsen had joined my and he briefly glimpsed a Grey Phalarope flying around the corner from where I had seen it so chances are it was the same bird that had landed and remained invisible to me).
After this excitement there was another Little Gull and more Kittiwakes and Fulmarts. I gave up at 1230 by which time I had racked up 75 Little Auks, 8 Fulmars, 6 Kittiwakes, 68 Common Gulls, 42 Guillemots/Razorbills the majority of which were most likely Guillemots, 17 Commn Scoter and 6 Velvet Scoter.
One of my hopes for the day had been Leaches Petrel and I got news later in the day that one had been seen going south just a few kilometres north of me. Unfortunately I got the news 4 hours after the bird was seen so it had presumably slipped past unoticed.

Fulmar

Fulmar

Kittiwake

I decided on a quick trip with Ketil to Kurefjorden to see if I could see Red-necked Grebe as one had been reported there since my visit last week. Well no red necks (on the water at least) but 3 Slavonian Grebes, 14 Great Crested Grebes, 4 Little Auks (looking very our of place), a Great Grey Shrike (I've now lost count!), a flock of 12 female Scaup, a calling Chiffchaff, Black Woodpecker and a few Common & Velvet Scoters.