No new reunions this time although I have strengthened my acquaintance with the subjects of my last two posts.
The Med Gull has clearly hung around and was seen at Østensjøvannet on Thursday before disappearing again. A family walk around the lake on Sunday revealed it was back but it was gone again on Monday. It was together with Common Gulls and was feeding together with them on football pitches looking for worms rather than the bread eating Black-headeds. There are plenty of places in Oslo that attract Common Gulls searching for worms but that will change once temperatures fall below zero. If the Med Gull decides to stay the winter then it will probably out of necessity become a gluten lover.
the picture I had hoped to take last week - 1st winter Med, Common and Black-headed Gulls together
Med and Common Gull
looking for worms
Talking of temperatures below zero the first snow fell on the hills around Oslo at the weekend although it has turned warmer again now.
no snow in this photo of a very autumnal Maridalen yesterday
I have now found two Pygmy Owls in Maridalen with both still in the forest and there has been a bird in another place so currently three birds is a good start to the winter season. Two more sightings of Great Grey Owls close to Oslo also give me hope for an owl winter. One was hunting from wires along a busy road in farmland which is a sure sign of how bad the rodent situation is in the forests. I had a nocturnal session in Maridalen last night with high hopes for a Tengmalms or two but it disappointed with only a single Tawny and surprisingly no noise at dusk from either of the Pygmys I had seen earlier in the day.
Pygmy Owl (spurveugle)
No sooner than the photographers filled up the feeders for the winter season and Marsh Tits are back in Maridalen although I am sure they never left and will most likely have bred unnoticed. No Waxwings yet but there are still lots of Rowan berries and plenty of time for both them and Grosbeaks to come.
Due to the almost viral success of my Reunion posts I am sure that you, dear reader, are overjoyed to see that you have yet another one to read….
This one concerns a species that looked like it would become an annual if still rare guest in Oslo before suddenly vanishing from the record books. From 2011 there were almost annual records of Mediterranean Gull including three observations in Maridalen and there was even a breeding attempt a Fornebu in 2022 but after a bird in the autumn of 2023 there has been a complete stop in records, that is until yesterday (my bird at Nordre Øyeren earlier in the autumn doesn't count as Oslo).
Yesterday' bird (it has not been reported so far today) was at Middelalderparken where the fresh water lake and lawns are very attractive for gulls to wash in and rest on. It gets too little attention though from birders though probably because we have lost our greatest larophile (Sindre Molværsmyr who found Norway's first Pallas's Gull nearby in 2014 has moved away from Oslo) and since his departure the number of interesting gull sightings especially those of the Large White-headed variety has fallen off a cliff. There are a couple of ringers who occasionally find an interesting gull or two but seem to be uninterested in disseminating the news to mere mortal birders. I do think though that there has been a real reduction in the frequency of rare and scarce gulls in Oslo - white wingers definitely are much less frequent not just in Oslo but in Norway generally. The one birder who does still look for gulls on a fairly regular basis, including trips to the tip at Alnabru, is Stig Johan Kalvatn so it was fitting that he found yesterday's bird on his lunch break. After he put out the message it was an easy bus ride for me with the bus leaving 3 minutes walk from one stop and being 3 minutes walk from another - maybe I should be looking for gulls myself...?
There were not huge numbers of gulls in the park yesterday possibly because the lake has, for a long time, been drained for maintenance and mostly resembled a muddy puddle but there was an interesting array of Lesser Black-backed Gulls of all age classes and appearance.
1st cy Med Gull (svartehavsmåke) when I first set eyes on it.
with Common (fiskemåke) and a Black-headed Gull (hettemåke)
three species in one photo. If the BhG had also been a 1cy then it would have been a very educational shot
the gull in the middle and another couple of admirers watching it
A young Black-headed Gull (hettemåke) that I think did a quite good Slender-billed Gull (smalnebbmåke) which seems to be in quite an advanced and abraded plumage for early October
a fairly pale young Herring Gull (gråmåke). Species is easy enough (unless it is a Great Black-backed Gull in which case I will get my coat..) but what age is it? A 2nd cy due to the rounded primaries? With the uncertainty I have over these birds it is no wonder I normally stear well clear of them...
and a much darker bird that I have to admit to being unsure as to its identity. I had assumed 1cy Lesser Black-backed (sildemåke) when I took the photo but looking at the details on the tertials and great covert feathers I am unsure and it may be a dark 1st year Herring Gull (gråmåke). A photo in flight would have nailed the ID
a 2cy Lesser Black-backed Gull (sildemåke)
and another 2cy LBbG
and what I believe must be a 3cy LB-b Gull but I wonder why it still has such pink legs. This bird is exceptionally long winged which is a feature associated with ssp fuscus. It were to be a fuscus (which is recorded extremely rarely in southern Norway) then it would have to be 2cy but I am now really getting out of my depth so will stop talking about gulls..
the first Great Grey Shrike (varsler) of the autumn was in Maridalen
Some pleasant surprises in Oslo and Maridalen regarding
breeding birds means I am not completely over into the butterfly world just yet.
On the lake there was suddenly a single adult Mute Swan with
5 small young! This is just like last year in that they suddenly appeared but
this year I was better prepared and had discovered the nest on 26 May. After
that discovery of the nest though I had been unable on subsequent attempts to
see any birds on it (although it was very difficult to see) and had only a
record of single adult on 1 June and then a pair flying over the lake (not near
the nest) on 9 June. I therefore assumed that the nesting attempt had failed
and the birds had moved off. To suddenly see an adult with young was therefore
a shock and it was equally surprising that I could not find the other adult
anywhere on the lake. Has the male died or moved off? And if so how did the
female managed to incubate and feed without me ever seeing her? And the pair I
saw on x June – were they visitors? Perhaps the other pair that started nesting
and then gave up? An answer to the first question is that P578 who I saw on
Maridalsvannet on 29 April, and his ring was again read on 24 May, who is the
male of the pair that bred last year and I assume the father of this years young
was seen on 16 June at Fornebu where he and his mate had spent the winter – so
it looks like he has left his mate to fend for herself! Did this happen before
the eggs hatched?
Mute Swan (knoppsvane) - presumably female PC79 who bred here last year - with 5 small young but not with her mate (P578) who has flown down to Fornebu!
The Black-throated Diver pair (one of perhaps two on the
lake) still have a single youngster and have moved quite a way from the nest
with it.
Black-throated Diver (storlom) family
The ever growing cereal crop on the Lapwing field makes seeing
the birds very difficult but yesterday I could see 3 (2 + 1) almost fully grown
young which is a great relief but the fate of the two last nests remains unknown.
a nearly fully grown Lapwing (vipe) young
And finally, I had Red-backed Shrike in the Dale this year
and it seems to be a nesting pair so fingers crossed for their success.
pair of Red-backed Shrikes (tornskate) in Maridalen
and the male on his own
A visit to Østensjøvannet today also revealed lots of young
birds. Best of all were the Black-headed Gulls which have had their first successful
breeding season (at least as a colony) for a few years with many large young on
two islands. Great Crested Grebes, Coot and Mute Swans also had young (the
later no larger than the ones I saw on Maridalsvannet) and surprisingly a
female Goldeneye had 11 quite large young with her. This raises two questions –
are they all hers? Perhaps unlikely. And how have so many survived so long? Normally
the vast majority get eaten either by gulls or pike.
Black-headed Gulls (hettemåke) have had a successful breeding season at Østensjøvannet
and a male Gadwall (snadderand) which once again seems to have chosen Østensjøvannet to moult although this year there were no records earlier in the spring
Today I decided to leave Svellet alone and instead visit the
Oslo islands. I cannot see that anyone else has visited Svellet today so don’t
know if my decision was the right one but I can see that water levels have only
risen by 2cm so conditions will still be
very, very mighty.
The islands gave a perfectly acceptable account of
themselves even if the fjord contained not a single duck, diver, grebe or tern
of any interest what so ever. Before I had even got to Gressholmen I saw a
massive 4 species of waders (but only one of each) in the tiny muddy bay by the ferry stop at
Lindøya Øst (Redshank, Greenshank, Ringed Plover and Oystercatcher) and this
did increase expectations rather considerably. Gressholmen’s muddy bay disappoints
(me) more often that otherwise but mid to late May is probably when it is at
its best. There had been no rain or southerly winds (they are from the north at
the moment) so I did not expect too much but a Bar-tailed Godwit that has been
present a few days was still there alongside the same species, but in greater
numbers, as I had seen at Lindøya.
A singing Thrush Nightingale in exactly the same scrub as
the last two years was my first of the year and a joy to listen to.
A worrying aspect of the trip was quite how few Black-headed
Gulls there were. I only found two colonies and the largest was considerably smaller
than it has been in previous years. I have also seen that Oslo’s normally
largest colony on an islet off Bygdøy is empty this year so unless there is a
large colony somewhere else then it looks like a crisis for the species (the inland
colonies at Sognsvann and Østensjøvannet are small in relation to the number
that normally breed on the fjord).
The absolute highlight and a slight headache came when I was
getting on the ferry at Lindøya. I heard angry Hooded Crows and Swallows behind
me and turned expecting to see a Goshawk. What I did see was something smaller
but after a second I realised it was an owl and must be one of the earded ones.
I raised my bins whilst walking and saw the face and was sure it was a
Short-eared. I then got on board and reached for the superzoom and filmed
whilst the ferry left the dock but only managed 20 seconds before the deckhand
said I had to move inside. I was quite happy that I had managed to document
only my second ever Oslo Short-eared and decided to look at the video to see if
it was any good and of course to see if I had actually pressed record… Well
this time I had but the owl proved to be of the longer eared variety. Still a
very good bird in an Oslo context. My still only ever record of Short-eared Owl
was an equally difficult experience although then I assumed it had to be a Leo
and it was only the pictures that allowed me to see it was a Seo…
a clip from the video showing the grey face and under wing tips that have fine baring and not a particularly black tip all of which say Leo (hornugle)
and here it disappears to the north over Hovedøya and towards the city
The sound of the Thrush Nightingale (nattergal) and a Willow Warbler (løvsanger)
the Bar-tailed Godwit (lappspove) on Gressholmen
The Black-headed Gull (hettemåke) colony on Nakkeskjær where I counted 65 nests although there were undoubtedly more out of sight on the far side
a close up of some of the nests
and here 9 nests on the main part of the island where they do not look to be so safe
a female Wheateat (steinskvett)
In Maridalen it was again difficult to be certain what was happening with the Lapwings but I did see more today. There were 10 adults and five young in broods of 4 and 1. There was also another female acting as though she had young in the long grass and probably two females that were on new nests but that will have to firmed up as a bit more time passes.
the single young Lapwing (vipe) with mum and a "singing" Snipe (enkeltbekkasin)
I frequently am accused of being overly optimistic in my
bird forecasts and expectations but I see that my predictions in my last post
for Svellet were actually very pessimistic. The wader fest is far from over as
the water levels have stopped climbing (at least for now) and there clearly is
enough food available as wader numbers which fell on Wednesday rose sharply yesterday
(when I did not visit) and were still high today. Viewing conditions are far from
great which is par for the course there but today I was able to pick out a Temminck’s
Stint although another one on nearby Merkja was much easier to view (as were
two yesterday evening which I twitched at Fornebu).
Yesterday gave me a non-wader mass bird event and a quite
unique one at that. Very large numbers of Willow Warblers have been seen
crossing the fjord from Nesodden and they have been then concentrating at Østensjøvannet.
It would appear that frost nights to the north (temperatures were under zero on
Tuesday evening as we drove home form owling) are stopping the nocturnal
migration of the Willow Warblers and they seem to be stopping their northward
journey in the Oslo area and then continuing northwards during the day and moving
whilst also searching for food. There is not an overabundance of insects yet in
Oslo but Østensjøvannet clearly has good numbers. There were over 1000 Willow
Warblers as I walked around the lake and every tree and bush was dripping with
them. They were also feeding in long grass, on the short grass of playing fields,
on a newly ploughed field, on the paths and many were sallying after insects in
the manner of a flycatcher from any available perch including fence wires. It
truly was an amazing experience both visually and orally as birds were also
singing everywhere. There were not many other species that had clearly arrived
with the WWs except for Blackcaps which were more common that normal but not in
exceptional numbers. That there were lots of insects to eat though was shown by
House Sparrows that were flycatching and Bramblings taking insects alongside
the WWs in bushes.
This video gives some idea of how it was but does not pay
the experience the justice it deserves:
Svellet 8th May as viewed from the eastern shore
and viewed from the west - still lots of mud and shallow water which clearly has more food than I expected after the water levels rose so quickly
A really heart warming sight at Østensjøvannet are the Black-headed Gulls (hettemåke) that are nesting again. There are three small colonies (including this one) and scattered single nests around the lake and the total number of nests may not be much more than 50 but this is in stark contrast to last years dire situation but also the 2000 odd pairs that used to breed here. Fingers crossed that there are lots of fledged young in a month or two. There is also a good colony at Sognsvann - it would appear that the two most visited lakes for recreational use are attractive to both humans and gulls - but I have yet to notice any nesting on the fjord so I fear that overall things are not good for the species
yesterday and today I could not see a single young Lapwing (vipe) in Maridalen but there is a new nest although as this field was only ploughed on Sunday I am not sure whether she is incubating or just in the egg laying phase
and the Mute Swans (knoppsvane) are now finished with nest building and are on the nest although I do not know whether any eggs have been layed yet
