Bugs & Shrikes

 I have yet to see either the Purple or White-letter Hairstreaks nectaring but a trip to Fornebu yesterday to allow the Beast to run around socialise within the fenced in dog park gave me at least 5 Brown Hairstreaks (slåpetornstjertvinge) which were all nectaring and showing ridiculously well. I saw the upperwing of 4 and all these were males suggesting that they had only just emerged (males usually emerge before females). This is a very good count for this species in Norway and the planting of lots of ornamental plant including Blackthorn seems to have been good for them and Fornebu may well be one of the very best locations for the species.

I also saw 3 musk beetles which is an enormous species of longhorn beetle. There were not many birds to see although I did flush a migrant Great Snipe from long grass whilst searching for butterflies.

Today I was in Maridalen and came across quite a few Red-backed Shrikes. First I had a male with three young begging for food. It is normal that it is the male that looks after the young once they leave the nest and the female normally disappears very quickly. It was therefore surprising when I later found an adult female feeding a single youngster. Had the male been predated and she was left to bring up the young on her own?

male Red-backed Shrike (tornskate)

juvenile and male

a headless youngster

and an adult female with a youngster

Brown Hairstreak (slåpetornstjertvinge)

all brown upperwing shows it to be a male

a Common Blue (tiriltungeblåvinge) and a slightly obscured Brown Hairstreak

Musk Beetle (muskosbukk)

Peacock butterfly (dagpåfugløye)

Green-veined Whites (rapssommerfugl) attempting to mate

The Guide is hot!

A very enjoyable half day guiding John and Ed today resulted in a number of desired birds being seen even if we did all nearly wilt due to heat stroke in the process. Temperatures reached 25C but there was next to no wind and it started getting uncomfortable after noon (it’s no coincidence that I chose to live in a country where such temperatures are rare).

We started at Fornebu where 3 Red-backed Shrikes performed admirably including one which caught a grasshopper and flew up with both the grasshopper and the grass it had been sitting on in its beak. Birds such as Yellowhammer, Sisken, Lesser Redpoll, Tree Pipit and Willow Warbler also showed well.

Nutcracker was a highly desired species so I chose to visit the “guaranteed” site of Vestre Gravlund cemetery knowing that we would also have a chance in Maridalen. Guarantees are not worth more than the paper they are written on unfortunately but an adult female and young Hawfinch showed very well.

Maridalen did produce the goods though with a couple of Nutcrackers although unfortunately only seen in flight plus another 2 Red-backed Shrikes and Whinchats. One of the shrikes was perched no less than 10 metres from us and flew down to take a bug from the ground right in front of us – what a picture that would have made! We did gaze skywards a bit but a single Sparrowhawk was the only raptor to see. It was mobbed by a group of Swallows and we commented that this was a dangerous game the swallows were playing and sure enough the hawk did launch into an aerial pursuit of one its mobbers but the swallow survived to reconsider its actions.

male Yellowhammer (gulspurv). This species is still relatively common in Norway but has declined terribly in the UK

a Red-backed Shrike (tornskate) is obligatory but here it's more of a scenic shot

I'd love to know what this beetle(?) is called. And....thank you Håvard Hauer it is called moskusbukk in Norwegian and according to google is called musk beetle (Aromia moschata) in English and is a member of the longhorn beetle family