Hazel Grouse reunion

I have previously written that Hazel Grouse are a challenge to find this year. After having my last meeting with my previously reliable male (and his normally far shyer mate) in February I have really struggled to find birds despite checking many territories that have been occupied in last 20 years or so. It does seem to me and others who know the species that it has become genuinely far scarcer in Oslo’s forests and quite abruptly. Why this should be is unclear. There has been extensive forestry work in some areas which have changed some territories but there are also empty territories in nature reserves where everything looks the same as it always has.

It was therefore a big relief to find two birds in the same small area yesterday. Both sang and almost in duett with one song being notably louder and clearer than the other. I only got to see the louder bird well and this a nicely marked male with a clearly visible red skin patch above the eyes. As I did not see the other bird well I was unsure as to whether I was hearing two males or a male and female and also whether one of them could be my previously faithful male (we were only a kilometre from his old territory which now seems empty). Birds of the Western Palearctic (BWP) tells me though that females do not sing like males and it also tells me that each males song is different.

This video has the sound of both birds singing and sometimes on top of each other. It also features the Beast and as I have previously written I think having dog in tow does help find Hazel Grouse as they seem to show curiosity towards the animal:

I have previously noted that Hazel Grouse song varies but had never thought too much about it and hadn't worked out that the variation is between males and not within how each male sings. When I listen to my own recordings I can hear that Old Faithful sounds the same on each recording I have taken between 2021 and 2026 whereas other males sound slightly different. Neither of these males songs is the same as Old Faithful which can be heard here this February and here back in 2021 the year I found him and his song can be heard to be the same 5 years apart. (I think I need to go through all the videos I have with singing birds to see if I can identify the same individuals over time from other territories I have visited over the years)

Hazel Grouse are normally to be found in male-female pairs so finding two males together is odd but autumn is when pairs are formed and there may well have been a female nearby that they were trying to impress or they could have been competing over territory. That one bird had a clearer and louder song than the other suggests to me that bird with a weaker song may have been a bird of the year who was only just starting to sing.

Here is a video of the stronger singing male (but not of him singing) and then some photos of him.

male Hazel Grouse (jerpe)

it was dark in the forest and the superzoom was pushed to its limits

Pallid time

I have had a couple of very enjoyable and of course successful guiding trips recently. Both were morning outings with the delights of Maridalen featuring in the first trip and the second which entailed a pick up in Lillestrøm worked well to put the spotlight on Årnestangen and Nordre Øyeren. For the Årnestangen trip I was booked as a birthday present from a clearly very loving and thoughtful wife in Panama for her husband who was in Norway on business!

We were at Årnestangen on Sunday morning and there were far more birders there than usual with a Pectoral Sandpiper seen the previous day probably being the draw. The Pec was not refound but it turned out to be a good raptor day. Ryan and I had Hen Harrier, Peregrine, Merlin and White-tailed Eagle among others but after we had left a juvenile Pallid Harrier was seen.

Pallid Harrier is a species I cannot get enough of. When I was a teenager it did not even feature in the bird books I had but has in the last couple of decades clearly expanded westwards. The reasons are not clear but changes in farming practices in the former Soviet republics are a possible cause with birds having to look for new breeding sites as old ones become unsuitable.

I have been lucky enough to find three birds myself but none have been exactly good views. I have twitched a couple of males that spent thesummer one year near Valdresflya and that was a great though damp and grey experience. For a long time I was missing a good, prolonged and close meeting with a juvenile bird though but that came to fruition in 2022 with another twitch but only half an hour from home.

Every autumn I visit places such as Nordre Øyeren with the plan of finding a Pallid Harrier but am always disappointed. Yesterday when I decided on another trip to Årnestangen I had the same hope but nevertheless expected to be disappointed. It was a damp start to the day and definitely not classic raptor conditions but there were raptors. First a Marsh Harrier then a Hobby, then the Marsh Harrier again and as I tried to get the scope on it another raptor appeared and it was a juv Pallid Harrier! I assumed it was the same bird as two days previously but later experiences make it clear to me that it could very well have been a new bird (and there seems to be quite a few birds moving through southern Norway in these days). With only the superzoom my digital memories of this fairly close encounter are of course not that great but hey I enjoyed it!

 

juvenile Pallid Harrier (stepphauk)

just as striking from above

The raptors were far from over in their generous giving though. As I retreated in my steps to try to refind the harrier which had disappeared behind some bushes I looked up and saw an immature White-tailed Eagle chasing a Peregrine. The falcon, an adult, had a wader, probably a Ruff, in its talons and was trying to gain height and fly away from the eagle but the eagle kept catching up and following the falcons every move. The falcon then dropped its prey and the eagle stooped down and caught it mid-air!! I was certain that the Peregrine could out manoeuvre the eagle but maybe the prey was just too large and heavy for it. Impressive flying by the eagle though and something I wish I could have recorded digitally although I was so enthralled watching it that I didn’t even consider lifting the camera. When this was over I then saw that the Pallid Harrier was flying over where I had first seen it and I then hurried back there and out to the end of the peninsula. I chose to watch from the old tower as I thought the elevated position might prove advantageous and it did. I picked up a female Hen Harrier working her way towards me and then she put up the Pallid which must have been resting unseen in the grass! The two flew together for a bit and then disappeared from view. I waited a god while hoping they would reappear but in vain. I then hurried out to the end of the peninsula and as I did so the Pallid flew quickly past and then in true Top Gun style did a fly-by of the tower where I had just been standing!!!

 

3 of 5 White-tailed Eagles (havørn)

female Hen Harrier (myrhauk)

I then spent around three hours on the platform at the tip and have to say I was pretty happy with my time there. There were quite a few waders including my first Grey Plover of the year I twice heard a call that matched the recording of Pec Sand that I had on my phone but never saw the bird that gave it although there were clearly many waders that were very hidden as a couple of Lapwing only gave themselves away after I had been there a couple of hours when a Kestrel caused them to call and then briefly fly up from behind a long line of willow bushes. Many of the waders present match what was seen on Saturday to it wouldn’t be a complete surprise if the Pec Sand was also present but well hidden.

Bird, if not sighting, of the day was a 2^nd winter Mediterranean Gull which I picked up resting with Herring and LBb Gulls before it quickly flew off. This was a species that up until a few years ago was becoming almost expected but has since become rare again.

There were also a couple of Great White Egret, a migrating juvenile Honey Buzzard (I have never seen so many as this year which must be proof of a great breeding season) and then another sighting of a juvenile Pallid Harrier. It was suddenly in the air with a Hooded Crow harassing it and then landed for a few minutes and giving good scope views before then flying off south-west over the water and then thermalling over the “mainland” before disappearing. This bird had a different jizz and did not appear to be quite so long and thin winged as the earlier bird making me sure I had seen two different birds.

 

this is the second Pallid when it briefly rested before crossing the water to the SW

and this video has the first Pallid, the female Hen Harrier, both harriers flying together and then the second Pallid together with a Hooded Crow both in flight and on the ground

Here is my eBird checklist for the day, a day I reckon will be hard to beat this autumn, or at least until I go to Værøy in three weeks 😊

this Black Woodpecker (svartspett) was in a the final bunch of trees at the end of the peninsula and on three occasion flew out heading south (and otherefore over the water) before each time returning. If 3km of water is too far then it is no surprise they have never been seen in GB

a latish Red-backed Shrike (tornskate)

and another

here we see one of them is carrying a ring

and a picture from Maridalen of a migrating juvenile Honey Buzzard (vepsevåk). I know the bird is completely unidentifiable in this picture but you can at least see it is in Maridalen

and three Common Buzzard (musvåk) in a tree

Summer hols kick off

School, and university, summer holidays have begun and we are once again privileged to be allowed to use the wonderful cabin at Hulvik. A week of sun, the odd butterfly and maybe some Nightjars awaits plus late nights watching football - Norway vs Senegal at 2am tonight anyone?

Yesterday, I guided Ian from Perth (the one in Australia) in the morning and Maridalen provided a number of lifers during a very fun morning. We discovered a new (and second) Wryneck nest as well as watching feeding time at the very late Black Woodpecker nest, Red-backed Shrikes, Hawfinch, Marsh Warbler and lots more.

Here is a video from the Wrynecks which I took early this morning. Make sure to listen until the end to hear the strange noises the young make.

More successful breeding stories are the Ringed Plovers at Fornebu where both young are now so good as fully grown and still being well cared for by both parents who run distraction displays. This video from Saturday was taken with my phone from the car and may, or may not, show the youngsters.

And in Maridalen today I saw 7 basically fledged young Lapwings - they look fully grown and can fly - but still had adults watching over them. They seemed to be broods of 4,2 and 1 which tallies well with earlier observations. The fate of the two late nests and any young that hatched remains unknown with the crop so high that I cannot see any birds that may be there and I am not sure the adults would bother to fly up to chase off a passing crow either. A minimum of 7 fledged young from 5 nests is probably enough to maintain the population as long as they don’t fly to France for the winter and get shot…

5 Lapwing (vipe) an adult and 4 young

Au revoir GG?

On Thursday I guided to Great Grey Owls for what will probably be the last time this season. The chosen bird was Miss Hissig, the unusually vocal female who has always made her presence known by bill snapping whilst we are more than 50m away. On Thursday she had also added a rather menacing growling to her repertoire and this may have been due to the presence of a fairly large young on the nest. We kept a respectable distance and didn’t place ourselves between the female who was perched high in a pine about 25m from the nest and the nest itself. There was also the possibility that there was a young on the ground and should one approach such a bird too close then the chances are very high that the female will attack (it is this instinct that ringers use to catch the adult females with a large net). We clearly chose an acceptable spot to stand as she soon became quiet although any noise or perhaps movement elsewhere in the forest could attract her attention and start a series of growls and snaps.

We hoped to see the male arriving with food but early afternoon was never going to be the best time although at one stage the youngster became very animated and started calling excitedly which I felt certain was going to prelude dad flying in (mum had also looked excited) but nothing happened. The young which had been out of sight when we arrived became more and more active during our stay so was I assume getting hungry. It also rained briefly which I thought would cause mum to fly to the nest to cover the young but that did not happen either. This female really is a strange beast but it hasn’t stopped her, or perhaps more importantly her mate who brings the food, from raising a youngster to very close the jumping out of the nest stage in a year where voles are clearly in short supply.

The excited calling from the nest at one stage sounded like it was coming from two birds so the single large bird we saw may also have a smaller, younger, sibling that was not yet large enough to peer over the edge of the nest platform.

The video included sequences of mum bill snapping and growling (good speakers may be necessary to hear this) and the youngster calling excitedly.

I am very excited to see how this winter and spring of next year will pan out. If vole numbers crash then we could see Great Grey and other owls spreading around looking for food and then we may be lucky enough to have an owl winter around Oslo. Should this happen though then the chances of spring 2027 being good for singing and breeding owls is low. Vole numbers may however hold up for another season meaning next spring is similar to this, i.e owls breeding but at low densities and with few young. Only time will tell.

Satisfying guiding

Two very enjoyable and successful days of guiding different clients (Martin from Edinburgh and Andrew and Merril from New Jersey) have given some very nice birds. There was a large grey owl in the mix on Sunday and today was a morning of Oslo’s finest including Hobby, Rosefinch, Marsh & Icterine Warbler, Wryneck, Hawfinch, and all three species of Flycatcher 😊.

 

As usual when guiding I took very few photos and just used the superzoom so my digital output does not do justice to the two days.

something was watching us

is that a Robin?

no, it is Oslo's first reported Red-breasted Flycatcher since 2019. This species seemed to be on the cusp of establishing itself as a regular breeder and then just stopped appearing

More good guiding

I am just off the back of another two very enjoyable and successful days guiding. Wednesday was Hedmark Owls and a short and sweet best of Maridalen with Rob and Helen from Blighty and today was an Oslo highlights trips with Andy from New York.

Many good birds, good experiences, deep discussions and laughs were had. The best birds were of course Great Grey and Ural Owl plus Black Woodpecker and Wryneck on Wednesday and then on Thursday, Oslo (and suburbs) could offer amongst (many) others Thrush Nightingale, Honey Buzzard, Goshawk, Black-throated Diver (or Arctic Loon if you are so inclined), Temminck’s Stint, Velvet Scoter, Marsh, Wood and Icterine Warblers, Common Rosefinch and of course Black Woodpecker and  Wryneck. The bird that got me most excited though is one that will never appear as a “tick”. It was clearly a Branta goose and at first glance I was thinking Cackling Goose but after a bit more study it was clearly a hybrid between Barnacle Goose and either Canada or Cackling. I think Canada is the most likely other parent as it was not as small as I would expect a Cackling hybrid to be (I have previously seen one of these in Oslo in 2018) and lacked a throat collar. There is a population of feral Branta hybrids in Holland and these birds are very likely to come from there.

My own pictures are getting worse and worse but give an idea of what we witnessed. The video is from today with snippets of Thrush Nightingale, Temminck's, Rosefinch and the hybrid goose.

the lady

a high Honey Buzzard (vepsevåk) over Maridalen. Probably a female

presumed hybrid Barnacle x Canada Goose (hvitkinn x kanadagås) with Canada Goose in Sørkedalen.

The Ugly Owlet. Ural Owl (slagugle). Not long until this youngster makes the big jump

A day of rest

The Bird Gods deemed I was indeed not wicked and a day of rest was unexpectedly given to me today after an unavoidable guiding cancellation. This came after guiding yesterday and further guiding the next two days.

Yesterday’s guiding was a successful morning session in Maridalen for Gerald and Mary from Minnesota. We enjoyed birds both common and scarce and I hope some good photos were taken.

A Wryneck (vendehals) from yesterday: 

Graham and Marcus have started going through their photos and videos and posting on SoMe. Their results are, as I predicted, much better than mine and Graham made me blush with some very kind words.

Find Graham on Facebook (see account above) and Marcus on Twitter/:.

 

My most memorable and favourite video from my time in Norway 🇳🇴 insanely close views of this female Great Grey Owl, whilst getting some amazing footage of her I noticed she was starting to cough up a pellet! What a moment!!!!!!! I still have so much to share 🦉 pic.twitter.com/qkNbDcoLQo

— Marcus Workman (@MarcusW992) May 26, 2026

The day of rest was spent in Maridalen and looking more down than up. It was a very warm day and during the morning a few butterflies were clearly emerging and I found the first reported Germanium Argus (brun blåvinge) and Green-underside Blue (kløverblåvinge) in Norway this year. The argus was also my first record of the species in Maridalen and as I saw two of them (both females I think) I wonder if I have just overlooked them before or perhaps not been looking early enough in the year.

A nice selection of finches at a feeder in Maridalen today:

Grizzled Skipper (bakkesmyger)

Geranium Argus (brun blåvinge)

Green-underside Blue (kløverblåvinge)

A Willow Warbler (løvsanger) with an abnormal song had me checking out the song of all manner of rare phylloscs until I eventually saw the bird:

Golden (Bread) Guiding

Rest, they say, is only for the wicked (as has been pointed out to me I have got that expression completely and rather embarrassingly wrong! It is of course NO rest for the wicked…😂) and this bank holiday has seen me guiding for southern Norway’s best birds which at the moment primarily means owls. I have spent three long, tiring, but very fun, and rewarding days with Graham and Marcus Workman where were have seen Great Grey, Ural and Tegnmalm’s Owls, Black Woodpecker, Wryneck, Honey Buzzard, Common Rosefinch, Icterine and Wood Warblers, Slavonian Grebe, Moose, Capercaille and so much more.

The Great Grey and Ural were rated as their best birding experiences ever and I couldn’t possibly disagree with that.

All the birds that I have been monitoring and checking in on this spring were present and correct and showed impeccably well with my only complaint to the Bird Gods being that the two singing Common Rosefinch that we found were boring brown 2cy males instead of the bright red older males that give them their name. It was only me complaining though☺️

 

I don’t have the time to write any more as I need to allow myself a rest as I am guiding again tomorrow and most of next week. I’ll just let the photos and video do the talking - it truly has been a great weekend!

This explains the Golden Bread reference. When Norwegian birders celebrate a lifer it is a tradition to celebrate with a Gullbrød (gold bread). This chocolate covered bar of marsipan is not to my personal liking but Graham and Marcus were keen to join the tradition. Here they are celebrating GGO which was lifer #1 but there were at least 3 more after that

my footage from the weekend pales into comparison with what these two got. Graham had a top of the range Nikon set up but  Marcus was just using an iphone 11 (the same as me) with an adapter on a Kowa scope and was taking fantastic videos and stills. I hope to link to their work later once they are home and have published it. And I think I will be getting an adapter - will sure be cheaper than buying a new camera and lens that I rather desperately need and to be honest may give better results

Great Grey Owl (lappugle) - this is the "hissig" female and as usual she greeted us by bill snapping and this time growling long before we could see her. Again she was perched in a tree when we arrived but then flew onto the nesting platform so presumably has eggs but once again I can only say that her behaviour is not normal

Ural Owl (slagugle) presumed female. We glimpsed the furry tops of the heads of probably two young in the hole of the nest box and the male was also in the area

it was a joy to see this young Tengmalm's Owl (perleugle) who was looking out at dusk of his own accord (i.e no need for my poor trunk scratching to be put to the test). I reckon it was going to leave the box that same night

This sequence from the Black Woodpecker nests shows first from the nest with the three young where both parents came into feed at the same time but only after we had waited for close to an hour and a half... Our presence clearly affected the behaviour of the parents though and we had to move further back before they came in and fed the young. The sequence in the video where it almost looks like they are engaged in ritual courtship is how they were acting when they did not dare to go the nest (i.e before we moved away). Right at the end is the female in the other nest where excavation seems to be over and hopefully egg laying has begun. As they are a good month later than normal it will be interesting to see if they succesfully fledge young.

male Black Woodpecker (svartspett) and young

Slavonian Grebes (horndykker):

I also had a chance to check the second Ural Owl nest box and here the female was sat high so I reckon has newly hatched young but is around two weeks behind the other pair

The big lull

It’s been a long while since my last post and it has been an infuriating time but I’m sure I’ve written something similar many times before at this time of the year. We have entered what a lull with sunny, dry weather meaning no meaningful arrivals of birds and also difficult viewing conditions especially at Årnestangen and Svellet where long distances and hear haze become a real issue.

It is spring though and of course new birds are arriving but it is a trickle and there is no volume of birds. Slavonian Grebes have made their annual visit to Maridalsvannet, a visit that seems to come earlier and earlier each year. Other species that have arrived early are Wryneck, Pied Flycatcher, House Martin and Willow Warbler but raptor migration is still a dream despite me trying from a variety of places – I have yet to see a Hen Harrier let alone a Pallid..

I have just had two good days of guiding with Margie and Greg from Wisconsin where we racked up 85 species with Wryneck, Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, Ring Ouzel and Rough-legged Buzzard amongst them. Despite us starting the day early it became quite hard going after around noon with the sunny weather causing a real decline in activity. This sunny weather is forecast for at least the next 10 days so I fear that the magical Svellet spring that I was predicting may already be unlikely. The day we do get some rain though could end up being one of those days though.

 

After guiding and drop off at the airport I continued north for an evening in owl land. I twitched a Great White Egret on the way which I actually managed to see from the motorway at 110km/h but did also stop to admire a bit better.

Owls are a mixed picture. Ural Owls are giving me my best ever joy with the species with two nest boxes that I have checked now being occupied - this amounts to nearly 10% of the known Norwegian population!

Great Grey Owl though is a different story. I again visited the two nests from last year and found no birds by the natural nest. By the platform the female was still present but not on eggs. She is a strange one though and gave herself away by bill clicking when I was still close to 50m away and had not yet seen her. She is clearly territorial. 

 

One person who knows a lot more about owls than me reckons it is just still early in the season and that birds will nest and lay eggs whereas another reckons the rodent population has collapsed. Time will tell but unless they lay eggs in the next week or two it will be too late. In the Facebook group Ugler i Norden there are updates from a platform that has a camera watching over it. Here birds were first seen coming to the platform already 22 Feb and mating was observed from 7 April but the first, and so far only?, egg was not laid until 2 months later on 21 April. This to me suggests a pair who want to breed but are finding the food situation very borderline.

When in the forests a roadside female Capercaille was a treat and I continue with my tree scratching whenever I see a suitable hole. This time I did get a bird but and a Stock Dove was very unexpected given where I was but why oh why couldn’t it have been a Tengmalm’s?

Six Slav Grebes (horndykker) on Maridalsvannet - an Oslo record count!

a single bird two days later may well have been in addition to the six

Two Ring Ouzels (ringtrost) - it always feel like a big relief when I see these in the spring as it is a species I never feel guaranteed to see in Oslo (but do)

female Lesser Spotted Woodpecker (dvergspett) whilst guiding. This bird was making a lot of noise and was I reckon unpaired and getting desperate

my first Wryneck (vendehals) of the year and another good bird to see whilst guiding

a great looking old Black Woodpecker hole that I was sure would reveal a Tengmalm's Owl (perleugle) but instead and for me very surprisingly revealed a Stock Dove (skogdue). At least my tree scratching skills seem to be OK now.

roadside female Caper (storfugl)

Great White Egret (egretthegre)

Great Grey Owl (lappugle) - the same bird as in my previous owl post

Ural Owl (slagugle) - also the same bird as in my last owl post

but he she is with her mate (on the left). I have rarely encountered the male at a nest site and then they are normally much shyer than this bird seemed to be. He flew in after the female called and maybe felt he had a job to do

and Ural Owl nest #2. This box is old and the bottom starting to fall out perhaps suggesting that whoever put it up no longer checks it and I hope it survives the season

Maridalsvannet on Monday morning. Lovely weather but no many birds

a very long, straight road in Hedmark's deep forests

A pair of Ringed Plover (sandlo) is clinging on at Fornebu and here, and in the video, the male is creating nest scrapes for the females approval. The area they were doing it in was very close to paths and roads so I suspect they will struggle.

I finally managed to read the rings on the Mute Swan (knoppsvane) pair that is visiting Maridalsvannet this spring. Surprisingly they are not the same pair that bred last year which have established themselves at Fornebu now. This pair have  been seen together since March 2025 when they were at Østensjøvannet but did not breed . The female P576 was ringed as an adult in 28km away in March 2017 so is a mature lady. She bred in 2022 with another mate but did not raise young whilst the male was ringed as a juvenile in November 2023 11km away and is so young that he wouldn't have been expected to breed before now

I have also seen Long-eared Owls (hornugle). They were a pair by an old Crow's nest but it did not appear that eggs had been laid yet