Day 4 was weather wise pretty much perfect for being in the field and far better than the forecast. Often there was no wind at all and you could hear the noise of a warbler’s bill snapping at an insect. There were only a few indications of new arrivals and it was not a big day by any stretch of the imagination but it was a good day to be out and about and 16,000 steps were pounded.
Experience of the day was a pod of Killer Whales powering through the sea off the north of the island early morning.
Bird of the day was a Common Rosefinch (only my third on Værøy and a species that is close to but not annual out here).
Learning of the day was that I cannot tell Olive-backed and Tree Pipits apart on call. These two species were traditionally considered inseparable on call but in the last 10-20 years it has been accepted that with experience you can tell apart. Based on my experiences and observations on Værøy I also thought I could but today that confidence came crashing down. I heard a pipit calling in flight and immediately identified it as an OBP. I had my phone ready to play the call and straightaway the pipit appeared above me calling and the call was as far as I was concerned the same as I was playing. It landed on the fish drying racks just a few metres away and I immediately set about taking pictures. Head on it did indeed look like an OBP with a black spot on the cheek but as it turned sideways on to me I thought the wing bars looked far too white and I wasn’t seeing any green tones. Then when it turned away and I saw the well streaked back I realised without doubt it was a Tree Pipit. This whole experience made me immediately realise my OBP record from yesterday had to be pulled and also had me wondering how I could have got it so wrong.
OBP in late autumn outnumbers TP on Værøy by around 10 to 1 and therefore identifying a bird as OBP based on call and then confirming it by seeing it is statistically very likely to happen. Had I (we) just been playing the numbers? I don’t know the answer to that but a Tree Pipit in October is rarer than an Olive-backed so I should perhaps be happy with my observation.
Other quality birds were a single YbW, Jack Snipe, Bullfinch, a tristis Chiffchaff, proper Barnacles Geese from Svalbard (rather than the feral birds around Oslo) and a Short-eared Owl and quantity was provided with hundreds of Redwings and Redpolls.
The view at 0715 - it all looked very promising
Sunrise at 07:29
Migrating Barnacle Geese (hvitkinngås)
Looking north at 08:08 with the island of Mosken and behind it the Lofoten island chain
Killer Whale
Not an Olive-backed (sibirpip) but a Tree Pipit (trepiplerke)
Jack Snipe (kvartbekkasin)
Common Rosefinch (rosenfink)
The wood (skogen) suffered in a storm a few years ago and all the trees in the middle have now disappeared leaving just a ring of trees. The Rosefinch was in the too of the tall Rowans to the right
Very Grosbeak like
A Common Snipe (enkeltbekkasin) doing an impression of a Jack by freezing at close range
It is the middle of April and the next six weeks are the
most exciting of the year (in the Oslo area at least). In addition to many new
birds for the year there are also new birding sites to reacquaint myself with
and I have now competed my first walk to the end of Årnestangen for the year as
well as my first grilling of the mighty Svellet.
Conditions today at Svellet were magical and I have a small
but growing hope that this will be one of those Svellet springs that are
entered into the history books, or at least get remembered on this blog. Today
the water level (3.61m) was perfect and there were enormous areas of shallow
water and wet mud. 2000 Teal and 234 Curlew were both good counts and the quality
came in the form of a male Garganey, a Bar-tailed Godwit plus two very early
Ruff and a Redshank. The weather over the coming weeks will be key to whether
conditions remain perfect and we need just enough rain such that the mud doesn’t
dry up but not too much rain (or sun that causes lots of melt water to flow down
the river) such that water levels do not rise too quickly. I hope every birder
in Oslo and Akershus is praying to the Birds Gods.
Svellet from the eastern side. Even though I describe conditions as perfect the distances are very long and a scope is essential and even then not always enough to identify all the birds out there
and some of the Teal (krikkand) and also the Garganey (knekkand). As I said they are a long way away
Årnestangen has also delivered with another very early wader
in the form of a Whimbrel, an early Swallow and a good selection of raptors
including a Red Kite which flew low over my head without me seeing it but that
I then caught up with in the scope at about 6km range…
Taiga Bean Goose and Greylags at Årnestangen today. This is a relatively late bird as were the 4 Tundra Beans I saw yesterday
the bird was close to the Geylags in size and had a long slender neck and long thin bill with thin lower mandible.
I had a very enjoyable and successful morning guiding
Barbara from Canada on Monday and we saw 60 species including Jack Snipe, Black
and Red-throated Divers, Lesser Spotted and Black Woodpeckers. And if you don’t
believe my description then read Barbara’s 😊
one of three Jack Snipe (kvartbekkasin) at Fornebu. This bird has been regularly feeding in the open and to me looks very much like a Broad-billed Sandpiper...
and a more expected shot of a Jack
and a Common Snipe (enkeltbekkasin)
male Kestrel (tårnfalk) in Maridalen
and a Mistle Thrush (duetrost) in The Dale
Little Ringed Plover (dverglo) are back at Fornebu and will hopefully breed again this year
and Ringed Plovers (sandlo) are also back at last years nest site although they have less and less space available to them
It has been commented that I moan about the weather nearly
as much as I write about birds and that is no doubt correct and to prove it –
the weather is just wrong at the moment! +12C night and day, southerly winds,
overcast and drizzle and not a good, out of season bird to show for it…I’m
hoping for Pallid Swift, Hoopoe, Desert Wheatear or at the absolute minimum a Firecrest…
I’m not sure if out of desperation or a real expectation
that there would be something good but I found myself sea gazing at Krokstrand
yesterday. The site of many a good seawatch a decade or more ago it now serves as
a reminder of how autumn weather patterns and arrivals of seabirds have
changed. For the nostalgia value it was good to be there and remember previous visits
with skuas of all 4 species, Brunnich’s Guillemot, Sabines Gull, Grey Phalarope
and all the more expected but still for these parts unusual stuff. Yesterday
wasn’t a disaster and there were birds and not just sea to gaze at but it was
not a day that will be remembered in a week’s time let alone a decade’s time.
Three Kittiwakes were the best of the bunch and there were double digit numbers
of Guillemots along with three each of Razorbill and Little Auk but I could
just as easily have seen the auks in Oslo.
A nocturnal visit into Maridalen with the thermal imager
revealed unsurprisingly that Woodcock are still around with 4 seen along a short
stretch. Slightly more unusual was a single Common Snipe and two Fieldfares that
were seemingly roosting on the ground in a stubble field. Nearby at least 20
Magpies were roosting together in some isolated bushes. A Tawny Owl called but
I picked up no other owls hunting over the stubble fields despite there seeming
to be increasing numbers of mice.
Krokstrand looking south towards more open sea
and looking north towards Oslo and the end of the fjord
Woodcock (rugde) taken just with the aid of my head torch
and here using the camera's inbuilt flash. Note how far up the mud goes on the birds long beak showing quite how deep it has been probing for worms
a Fieldfare (gråtrost) one of two which I believe were roosting on the ground rather than nocturnal feeding
and a Common Snipe (enkeltbekkasin)
an unusually easy to observe Little Grebe (dvergdykker) on the park lake at Valle Hovin. In Norway it is unusual to see one so well
Birding around Oslo continues in a very predictable manner.
I did have a small flock of Wood Pigeons seemingly migrating north but they may
also have been some of the small number of wintering birds just moving between
sites. Otherwise it has been same old, same old with Jack Snipe, Scaup, Kingfisher,
King Eider, Hawk and Pygmy Owl and the occasional Shag that have been receiving my attention, as
they have most of the year.
we haven't had much sun recently so it was pleasing to be able to see the Hawk Owl enjoying it
Common Snipe (enkeltbekkasin) is always more in the open and feeding when I find them unlike the Jack Snipes which are hidden amongst reeds
Jack Snipe (kvartbekkasin).
These videos show how the birds slowly relaxes after I disappear from view and also how quickly it reacts when I reappear
a Shag (toppskarv) at Bygdøy together with a couple of Cormorants (storskarv)
a Blue Tit (blåmeis)
a man, his dog and a Hawk Owl
distant Pygmy Owl (spurveugle)
Common Snipe (enkeltbekkasin) on a very cold morning but it had found some open water
