My frustration at the lack of birds has been rather obvious of late but I had forgot about the fjord off Fornebu which last winter held exceptional numbers of seaduck due, apparently, to a vast hatch of young mussels which they fed on.
On Thursday after an uneventful walk around Fornebu we then
checked out the sea and whilst the numbers of Common Eider, Velvet and Common
Scoter were back to normal levels (20-30 of each species) we did have 7
Long-tailed Duck which is a very good count here and best of all Elvis, the
long staying resident King Eider put in a rare appearance from land.
Also, a part of the fjord, Frognerkilen is an urban location
best known for being able to feed the ducks and swans but there is also a small
reedbed where I plan that one fine day I will add Bearded Tit to my Oslo list.
A Kingfisher has recently been reported from here and after three
attempts I also eventually saw it. Chatting to a man with a very long lens
though revealed that he had been watching it for a couple of months and has
managed to keep it quiet and not post (yet) any pictures on his SO ME so good
on him and the bird!
One of my unsuccessful visits was enlivened though with a
Jack Snipe which I think has been pushed out the reedbed due to a very high
tide and was stood upon some floating reedstems.
The weather forecast shows no return to wintery weather in
the foreseeable future and I am sure that Maridalsvannet will not freeze over
until January at the earliest. And who knows maybe we are in for such a mild
winter that it won’t freeze over at all which will be a first (though I think
that I remember one previous winter without ice before January).
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| Common Eider (ærfugl) and the noticeably smaller King Eider (praktærfugl) |
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| my camera was really playing up but you can glimpse the left half of a Jack Snipe (kvartbekkasin) here... |
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| ... and the right half here |
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| Kingfisher (isfugl) |
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| the Marsh Tits (løvmeis) are still showing well in Maridalen |
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