Jr and I have fled the heatwave Oslo is experiencing and have left temperatures in the mid thirties and replaced them with the low tens. This has resulted in two days and 1300km of driving to our cabin near Bodø. The weather should improve whilst we are here but I am writing this sitting next to a radiator on full…
As usual I kept a count of raptors on the drive up and it was a meagre total with just 3 Kestrels, 2 Peregrines, 1 Merlin, 1 Rough-legged Buzzard and 2 White-tailed Eagles meaning about 1 raptor per 150km….
Three well planned Beast walking stops did result in some action for me. A stop in 30C heat gave me an Apollo butterfly which even briefly landed on my head although the battery on my camera proved to be flat so I had to resort to photos with my phone. In this photo you can see me taking a photo of the Apollo.
Jr is the shade whilst I am enjoying this Apollo:
Just before we got to the Arctic Circle a stop in Mo i Rana gave me to two additions to my Nordland county list - Jackdaw (kaie) and Nutcracker (nøttekråke). I have tried for them here before with no joy but finally succeeded. Both seem to have an isolated northerly breeding outpost here and the Nutcrackers are of the siberian subspecies so are different to the birds around Oslo.
Adult and juvenile Nutcracker (nøttekråke) of the race macrorhynchos
Here the parent has extracted a seed from a cone to give to junior
A stop at Saltfjellet on the Arctic Circle was very successful with Long-tailed Skua and Red-necked Phalarope. The skua was actively hunting at very close range but I am unsure as to what it was searching for as a lack of any raptors suggests no rodents.
Long-tailed Skua (fjelljo)
Red-necked Phalarope (svømmesnipe) male who by his behaviour must have had young nearby
The final part of the summer holiday is beginning and for the first time since 2022 I will be back spending time at the cabin outside of Bodø, north of the Arctic Circle. Jr and I drove up starting from Oslo at 08:55 yesterday and we covered 1281km in 23 hours and 50 minutes with less than an hour of that used for sleep but including 5 stops for birding/butterflying and dog airing. When you drive north through the night in the middle of the summer it never gets dark and that helps keep tiredness as bay although once we got to the cabin we felt it.
Apart from the stops the drive up was extremely bird and animal free with the total of big/interesting species observed (excluding Cranes which are getting almost too common) being 2 Common Buzzard, 3 Kestrel, 1 Marsh Harrier, 1 Raven, 1 Fox, 1 Hare and 4 Moose. This is an appalling total!!
The stops were for Apollo butterfly which was a quick success, Pallid Harrier which was a dip although a male Hen Harrier did show, Ørin in Trøndelag for waders which was also a dip, Saltfjellet on the Arctic Circle where Red-necked Phalaropes and Ruff were good but no raptors or Long-tailed Skuas and finally 35 minutes from the cabin Klungsettvika where they were alarmingly few sea ducks but hopefully my stop was too fleeting and further visits will deliver more.
At the cabin a pair of Common Gulls has nested on the roof and two large young are still there with the parents guarding them - it will be a noisy stay!
Apollo butterfly - a beautiful beast of an insect
A bit more distant
There were also a couple of Hummingbird Hawk Moths (dvergsvermer)
Saltfjellet looking south
My first ever Lesser Teatblade orchid (småtveblad) which were tiny
Red-necked Phalaropes (svømmesnipe)
The view from the cabin and I have already seen Common Porpoise (nise) and Arctic Skua (tyvjo)
Our summer holidays are far from over but part 2 at the cabin in Bodø is over and I am writing this whilst we are driving back south.
The time at the cabin ended with a new, and my 66th Norwegian species of, butterfly when I again visited the alpine habitats around Sulitjelma and found a species I have long wanted to see - Northern Couded Yellow, which is orange on the upperside and impossible to miss as it flutters over the tundra. It was also much more approachable than the Pale Arctic Clouded Yellow which I again found and despite it quickly disappearing over the mountainside I manged OK pictures of it on the ground hiding in grass.
A quick stop on Saltfjellet as we crossed the Arctic Circle revealed the strange sight of 14 noisy Long-tailed Skuas and 2 Arctic Terns flying around high up seemingly catching flying insects.
Northern Clouded Yellow (mjeltgulvinge)
The undersidenwoth the sun shing through and showing the orsnge colours
The underside
A much better picture of a Pale Arctic Clouded Yellow (polargulvinge)
Golden Plover (heilo)
With the Blåmannsisen glacier in the background
Wigeon (brunnakke) duckling
Wigeon mum
Whooper Swan (samgsvane) family
6 Long-tailed Skuas (fjelljo)
Long-tailed Skua and Arctic Tern (rødnebbterne)
Female Bluethroat (blåstrupe) who clearly had young nearby
False musk orchid (fjellkurle)
habitat of Northern Clouded Yellow
Vanilla scented bog orchid (Fjellhvitkurle)
This balloon was floating over the cabin at 130,000 ft (39.6km) and is the size of a football stadium with an instrument to measure cosmic rays hanging under it. It was launched from Sweden by NASA. more info here https://sites.wustl.edu/xlcal/home/
