Just in case anyone was worried and wondering if I am still here then yes I am 😊
This very short post doesn’t feature a single butterfly, although there is a caterpillar of an Elephant Hawk Moth (stor snabelsvermer) which is a quite fascinating creature.
This video of things that I came across the last couple of days also shows you what I have basically been spending all my available time watching and documenting since coming back to Oslo at the end of July.
The hot sunny weather continues often with northerly winds and cold nighttime temperatures. This sort of weather means no falls or mass arrivals of birds and numbers and variety at Svellet suggests few birds are arriving or leaving at the moment. Some birds do of course arrive though and a trip out to the tip of Årnestangen on Tuesday resulted in me hearing a Citrine Wagtail. Despite my best efforts I could not find the bird but hopefully it will be last years bird returning and will therefore be refound soon holding territory. There are a few Yellow Wagtails back but none are singing yet and the very dry conditions and cold nights are probably not favourable for them or any other insect eating species.
A Great Snipe that flew up from long grass was also a good
bird and a nesting pair of Long-tailed Tits are something to marvel over. I encounter
a Kingfisher every visit, normally just hearing him or glimpsing him flying
away from me up the river. The only time I have seen the bird well it was a
male but I do not know whether it is the same bird I see each time. I assume
though that there is breeding nearby of a species that has definitely benefited
from a series of warmer, shorter winters.
Svellet continues to hold the same species and same numbers
every day with the Little Gulls remaining although there is probably quite a turn over of birds. There are still no calidris waders
but they will turn up any day soon and then the real fun starts.
In Maridalen one of the Lapwing nests survived the plough
which I suppose is good news but it is of course tragic that despite the
farmers good intentions that the other nests did not survive the plough.
 |
| this Long-tailed Tit (stjertmeis) with a mouth full of insects led to me a nest. I do not think they have young yet but rather it was food for the mate who was incubating |
 |
| the nest is a remarkable construction |
 |
| incubating bird. Note how the tail is sticking up through a hole in the nest. This reminds me of one of my earliest ornithological observations and which led to a letter in British Birds (for a teenager this was big!) when I found a nest building LtTits and one of the birds had woven its own tail into the nest construction and was stuck. |
 |
| taken with the mobile. The nest is large |
 |
 |
| male Kingfisher (isfugl) |
 |
| he is often hidden away in bushes away from the water where he calls occasionally but there is no suitable mud banks for a nest site here so I do not understand why he chooses to be there |
 |
| a stick marking a Lapwing (vipe) nest but the plough went far too close. The pair were hanging out close to their old nest looking a bit forlorn |
 |
| this nest survived though |
 |
| a female was in the grass and both her and her mate chased away gulls that came to close. It is possible that they have young (from the first nest I saw) that hatched before the plough. I first noticed a bird sitting on 8 April and with an incubation period of 28 days it is therefore possible that the young have hatched - hopefully i will see some soon |
 |
| my first Garden Warbler (hagesanger) of the year |
 |
| and my first Thrush Nightingale (nattergal) |
 |
| Black-throated Diver (storlom) with a crayfish in Maridalen. |
 |
| Osprey (fiskeørn) |
 |
| this male Smew (lappfiskand) that is in love with a female Goldeneye (kvinand) was on the oxbow lake at the duck hot spot of Stilla. This is surely the same bird that has summered to north east of Oslo since 2019 and was at Østensjøvannet last spring and turns up at different lakes depending on where his chosen Goldeneye choose to go. Here he is in 2020 |
 |
| yet another singing Wryneck (vendehals) in Maridalen |
 |
| water levels in Svellet continue to be perfect. Let us hope that we have no big rises in water levels but rather slow increases |
 |
| Svellet north 7 May |
 |
| Svellet south 7 May |
Whilst I was away at the weekend the ice melted on Maridalsvannet. This is early but despite it having been so dry the water levels are currently high so the lake doesn’t yet look that appealing. That being said though there have already been some good birds and maybe when the ice doesn’t melt until the end of the month as is often the case that means that a lot of birds are missed out on as they cannot splash down even if they wanted. Both species of diver are already back and their display calls ring around the valley. More impressively though has been the three , yes 3, species of grebes that have graced the lake. Following last years first ever record of Little Grebe in the Dale a bird in exactly the same place it was probably the same bird. Great Crested Grebe is more expected but a Slavonian Grebe hanging out with Teal is record early as this species normally passes through, and not annually, at the end of the month.
Raptors are still very thin on the ground but the first Osprey
of the year turned up on Tuesday and a Peregrine was hunting in the valley
today. Today also finally saw the first day with really good numbers of
passerines on the (very dry) fields: Bramblings, Redwings and Meadow Pipits
were the most numerous.
A real treat today was being able to listen to the calls of
migrating Curlews and a flock of 6 really wanted to land but in the end gave up
and flew north.
 |
| an ice free Maridalsvannet looking towards the south |
 |
| my first Osprey (fiskeørn) of the year - a particularly well marked female |
 |
| migrating Curlews (storspove) |
 |
| Little Grebe (dvergdykker) |
 |
| Slavonian Grebe (horndykker) |
 |
| and the best picture of all, a Great Crested Grebe (toppdykker)... |
 |
| there have been up to 10 Lapwing (vipe) on their favoured two fields and there are already two nests. Nest 1 |
 |
| Nest 2 |
 |
| Green Sandpiper (skogsnipe) |
 |
| a Kestrel (tårnfalk) today and a Brambling (bjørkefink) |
 |
| a young Peregrine (vandrefalk) that I saw three times today |
Yesterday I thought I would see if Sørkedalen had anything more to offer and caught up with the plastic hybrid goose that has been around for a couple of weeks and a real piece of plastic had me for quite a few seconds thinking I had seen my first Ring Ouzel of the year…
 |
| what looks to be a hybrid Emporer x Barnacle Goose together with Pink-feet |
 |
| showing leg colour |
 |
| and I thought this was a Ring Ouzel... |
The weather has continued to be conducive to raptor watching in Maridalen and I hoped to be able to pin down, at least roughly, where the Honey Buzzard has a nest but despite seeing and hearing him I have come no closer. However, I have found photos of the same bird showing quite how large a range he covers in his search for food. He must even at times fly very close to the nest I follow showing how different pairs share the same feeding territories. Given how widely he travels though then I find it strange that I have not knowingly seen “my” male anywhere but at/over the nest.
By looking at my pictures and other posted online I have found out that the recent male is the same as the one I saw skydancing on 26May and which has been seen by Stig over Tonsenhagen (SE of Maridalen) on 17August and yesterday and was also seen on Friday south of Sognsvann which was the same day I had two sightings in Maridalen. This bird can be individually identified by its almost perfect plumage with no missing feathers but some very specific damage to the primary tips of the left wing allow it to be recognised with certainty.
 |
| the male in Maridalen on Friday. I have circled the specific feather damage that can also be seen on the photos I have linked to plus in my photo from the last few days on this blog |
 |
| the lines at the top show how I saw the bird on Friday, the red cross is where is was seen the same day and the blue cross where Stig has also seen him. In the bottom left is the scale for 1km so he moves a long way |
 |
| on Friday he returned calling and I heard him from over 1km |
 |
| my first juvenile also on Friday. He appeared from the same area where the male had flown to but continued flying south on his own so was I believe a migrant |
 |
| this Hobby (lefrkefalk) showed well |
 |
| another Hobby trying to catch something |
 |
| juvenile Sparrowhawk (spurvehauk) |
 |
| an Osprey (fiskeørn) at Fornebu on Friday |
 |
| and one of three in Maridalen the same day. This a juvenile I believe |
 |
| and an adult yesterday which flew a long way north with this fish so clearly has young on the nest still |
 |
| a migrating Kestrel (tårnfalk) |
 |
| Yellow Wagtail (gulerle) |
 |
| my first Whooper Swan (sangsvane) in Maridalen for a while |
 |
| Water Rail (vannrikse) and Moorhen (sivhøne) at Fornebu |
 |
| the Water Rail trying to hide |
 |
| this Moorhen has been alone since it was very small but has raised itself well |
