Twitching a sleeping Stone Curlew

Whilst I was birding Oslo yesterday a message came through that a Stone Curlew had been found at Årnestangen. With under 50 records it is a national rarity and the only previous record in Akershus (it is still to be seen in Oslo) came just last year. This year’s record is interestingly the earliest ever in Norway. It goes without saying that I have not seen one in Norway.

I didn’t really consider going for it even though from the photos that were put out it was clear that the bird was at its daytime roost (they are primarily nocturnal birds) and it didn’t move at all until it was almost dark. In other words, it would have been an easy yet very boring twitch. I have to admit that this apathy to twitching is just a tad extreme especially as I do take my Akershus list seriously – I am just 7 species off the lead and everyone who is ahead of me has been birding here for at least a decade and in some cases 3 or 4 more than me so there are bound to be species that will turn up that they currently have over me.

I had no expectation that it would be present today (I am more open to day 2 twitching) but whilst walking the dog a message came through that it was again roosting in exactly the same spot. It was far easier today to make the decision to twitch and it ended up being as easy as I expected and also as boring. The bird was watched from a very safe range with lots of heat have and it not doing anything but hey, a tick’s a tick 😊

Årnestangen was otherwise very quiet with only a few raptors on a day that I had expected there to be many although a few Ospreys were my first of the year and a young Peregrine put on an amazing show as it chased and repeatedly dived at a Lapwing before eventually giving up allowing the Lapwing to fight another day.

A quick check of Maridalen on the way home revealed the first Black-throated Diver and Wheatear of the year.

Stone Curlew (triel). I am still debating with myself if this can be called a record shot but the video shows it better and I did manage to catch the only time when it did something other than sleep

and my first Wheatear (steinskvett) of the year on the same stones where I normally get my first bird