Last guiding of the year gives a pre-xmas Hawkie high!

My last guiding of the year was with Pau and Olga from Catalonia today. On the shortest day (or was that yesterday?) of the year daylight was a precious commodity but we had sun in the morning which at least meant we could bird soon after 9am.

First bird on the wish list was Hawk Owl and would he be sat in exactly the same tree as last week? Yes he would. A good start indeed J Also here we had Lesser Redpolls, Crossbills, Bullfinches, Yellowhammers and GS Wood.

Next sought after species was Waxwing and an emergency stop had us enjoying a roadside flock which showed very well. We also had a roadside GG Shrike but our next hoped for species was no so cooperative. I just couldn't find a Little Auk (despite having seen one yesterday) but we did have Guillemot, Razorbill, Kittiwake and Velvet Scoter at the three spots we tried.

With rain coming it got dark just after 2pm (days are short now!) which just gave us time to try for the fourth wished for species: Bearded Tits. They were calling from the reedbed at Fornebu and with multiple birds calling from two different spots I could be sure there are still at least three birds present but did they show? No!!

A very enjoyable day was had though and a day with Hawkie can never really go wrong can it?

happy campers scoring Hawkie

Waxwings in the 'scope

Tracking

An overnight dusting of snow was threatened by rising temperatures and rain this morning so I went early (well 10am when it was light enough to see anything) to Fornebu hoping to find some tracks in the snow to see what might be out there but that normally goes unseen.

At the reedbed at Storøykilen I had tracks of humans and dogs but more interesting was Roe Deer which are fairly common here and a couple of birds. One was I believe a thrush sp. and the other something bigger. It led out of the reedbed followed a tiny stream of open water and then went up a bank into a shrubby area. Checking my available literature and the interweb I’ve concluded with Water Rail although must admit that I find this difficult and also had to look at Pheasant, Woodcock and Common Snipe (Jack Snipe would be much smaller).

At Koksa I heard Bearded Tits and Reed Buntings but despite a lot of patience was only rewarded with a sighting of a single Reed Bunting in flight. A Water Rail made a lot of noise around the only area of running water and I managed a picture of sorts as it ran through a relatively open area of reeds. I had hoped to find tracks of this individual to use as a reference but found none that matched. I did find some tracks along the edge of the water but believe these were of Blackbird a few of which were also in the area.

I had some mammal tracks which crossed a frozen bay and concluded with Mink without being 100% sure although cannot imagine what else would be in this area.

what I've concluded are Water Rail (tracks)

and a picture of a Water Rail.......

What I  believe are Blackbird (svarttrost) tracks - note the long back toe

tracks of a mammal - Mink is my conclusion

 

Xmas shopping and some birding

Christmas shopping today gave the chance for some urban birding. I packed the cheap and trusty Sigma 70-300mm lens in my rucksack and stopped off first at Frognerpark. Here there were 80 Mallards and six Teal. The six Teal hold themselves apart from the Mallards and all carried on sleeping whilst the Mallards went into a frenzy when I threw out some bread. What and when do the Teal eat? One of the Teal, a ringed female (and possibly the bird seen on Akerselva?), kept itself away from the other five (a male and four females) which is exactly the same as I observed last year (same number of birds with only one male and a ringed female that didn’t mix with the others). If these are exactly the same birds then have none of them had young which have followed them?

Surprisingly there was not a single gull in Frognerpark and by the station in Majorstua there were only a few gulls with two adult Black-headed and 15 each of Common and Herring. It is my feeling that the numbers of gulls and especially smaller gulls that winter in Oslo has declined sharply the last few years but unfortunately the data set available is not as good as it could be due to the refusal of some to record their observations.

I also checked out Akersevla at Vaterland. Here there were 80 odd Herring Gulls but as usual no other gull species here. A young Cormorant of the subspecies sinensis was incredibly tame and would probably have shaken hands with me if it could. There are plenty of fish in the river and I don’t think the bird was sick but has just got very used to people (has been here a while).

uncropped iPhone photo of the juv sinensis Cormorant (mellomskarv)

This Mallard (stokkand) in Frognerparken was strange. It has many signs to male plumage but the bill is that of female (although it is also deformed). In addition it has a small, cute, head making it look strange. I'm not sure as to whether this is a female with an overdose of male hormones or a male with an overdose of female hormones although suspect it is a female. Such birds are known as intersex Mallards.

the Mallards went crazy when I threw out bread

but the Teals (krikkender) didn't even raise raise their heads.

A thin covering of snow and a cloudy sky had completely changed the landscape in Maridalen today.

yesterday

today

The right diet?

Temperatures down to -10C and a thick layer of frost make it feel almost wintery at the moment but by Friday temperatures will be up to +7C meaning the small amount of snow that is forecast to fall tomorrow night will not last long.

Today I had a nice stroll in Maridalen but soon regretted not having a hat as my ears started burning in the cold. The Shrike was not visible to me at first but four scolding Common Crossbills soon alerted me to it as they chased it in flight. It perched briefly on its once favoured wires before continuing away on its search for food. Amongst the crossbills was one giving the 2BC like trumpet call that I have heard a few times and which is a real trap for the unwary. Maridalen had little else to offer with no raptors making use of the nice conditions – a wondering Golden Eagle must be a distant possibility. The lake had a thin layer of ice in the bays and a couple of young Mute Swans were looking a little forlorn. It is interesting how Mute Swan parents push their offspring away much earlier than Whooper and Bewick’s although this is presumably explained by the latter two species being migratory and needing to teach their young the migration routes whereas the Mute Swans just make small local movements and reckon the young can work things out themselves.

I made a stop at Østensjøvannet which was well and truly frozen with just the usual two small areas of open water which the bread eating birds themselves keep ice free. The usual overwintering wildfowl population seems to be in place now although I was surprised to see the escaped Ruddy Shelduck still here as by this time last year it had moved off. Amongst 320 Mallard, were 28 Coots, 7 Canada Geese, 4 Barnacle Geese, 1 Greylag Goose and a female Pintail which is the only non-Mallard duck that is trying its luck this year. On the hybrid front the long staying Canada x Greylag and the newly arrived Wigeon x Mallard were present. The Wigeon hybrid is making good use of its Mallard genes and had no problem fighting for food when a women who the birds clearly recognised turned up with a plastic bag full of bread.

Amongst the Coots are two 1cy birds which are still in juvenile plumage. One of these must be the late juvenile I photographed on 21 October. The younger looking of the two juveniles has a misformed wing which apparently can be blamed on a poor diet which would not be surprising so late in the season when there must be much less choice of vegetable matter. This defect is often blamed on an artificial, for example bread rich, diet but I cannot remember ever having seen it on Mallards. The female Pintail which has been here a couple of months was in a very bad state today and I wonder whether this can be blamed on a bread rich diet. Mallards are presumably OK with bread rich diets which explains why they are able to adapt to so many habitats and climates whereas Pintails may not be so adaptable. Anyway the Pintail was standing on the bank when all the other ducks were in the water and was facing the sun and vigorously preening. Whilst preening it had its tail spread and both wings were shivering/vibrating coninually. Some of the feathers were clearly in a bad state although it was able to flap its wings normally. In one of the pictures I took it looks as though it may be injured under one of its wings although this may just be as a result of it being in bad condition. When the bread lady arrived it made no attempt to join in the scrum and I also never saw it on the water even when someone walked too close and scared it. Difficult to know the cause of the birds problems but it wouldn’t surprise me if it stopped being reported quite soon.

The juvenile Coot (sothøne) with a misformed wing. The ice on the feathers is a sign that it is not able to care for its feathers properly but it is amazingly still alive

from behind it doesn't look well

what I assume to be the same bird on 21 October

another bird still with some juvenile plumage on the chest but no deformities

a healthy looking adult Coot

this Coot was ringed just two days ago and aged as a 1cy and sexed as a male. That it is a 1cy can just about be seen from the small white frontal shield and the darker eye than the adult in the picture above. That it is a male was presumably determined from measurements with males and particularly their toes being significantly larger

surprisingly the Wigeon x Mallard hybrid remains bling free. Here it is joining in the bread melee

and it had no problem fighting its way to some

 

The unwell female Pintail (stjertand). From behind the spread tail and wings plus general poor state of the plumage can be seen

the wings were always hanging and shivering



here on the underwin it can be seen tat many feathers look to be in poor condition and there is flesh showing and possibly some blood on the feathers. Is this the result of an injury or just from being in bad form?

 
 

wonder how long this will survive

frost crystals

Maridalen's Great Grey Shrike (varsler)

exciting light at the moment. Here Maridalsvannet

Starting down the slippery slope again

I thought I’d put those days behind me – the days when I would desperately chase down my daily dose of the best birding high there is. A period of forced abstinence put me in charge of my habit and since then I’ve managed to enjoy the occasional recreational dose of Hawkie and then walk away. Last night though I felt that empty feeling in stomach starting to grow and by the time I woke up this morning I knew that I had to go visit a dealer and luckily there is one currently hanging about by a layby in Hurum close to Oslo.

I had all my equipment packed to enjoy the shot to the max and set off praying that I would find the dealer. I didn’t find him immediately and started to get panicky but luckily a member of the local anti-Hawkie brigade (a Great Spotted Pecker) was trying to get Hawkie to leave the area and the local youngsters alone and was scolding him loudly. And there he was…….The equipment came out: camera and tripod, I got within range, pressed in the shutter and enjoyed the rush.

 Light wasn’t great; it was cloudy although not overcast but there was no sunlight. Everything was covered in a thick layer of frost though so it was very atmospheric. There were a few Common Crossbills also in the area which were a bit agitated by the owl but little else. As is always the case with winter Hawk Owls it is difficult to work out why they have chosen exactly this particular area but it has been around a few weeks now so there would seem to be a good supply of rodents for it.

 On the way home I stopped at Fornebu. Bearded Tits were calling when I arrived at the reedbed and were fairly vocal all the time. The reason I could hear them was because they were very close and I could see reeds moving less than 10 metres from me. I have just read an interesting note on Beardies in British Birds and now understand that they feed mostly on the ground which explains why they can be so difficult to see. I watched for half an hour and could be sure from movement and noises that there were a minimum of three birds in front of me but I only glimpsed one which briefly flew a couple of metres. In addition I heard birds from another area and saw one of these flying over the reeds so had an absolute minimum of four birds.

This favoured lookout post was in a garden - maybe they have a rodent problem

stretch to the right

and just a bit more

here having a bit of feather care

got an itch, need to move

and I'm off

 

 

 

Frosty swans

With Christmas fast approaching and a long list of presents to buy not getting any shorter much of this weekend has not been spent outside enjoying lovely frosty winter weather. Today however we had a short walk in Maridalen in the middle of the day. It is not that cold – just a couple of degrees into the blue but there must be a lot of moisture in the air because it feels much colder and there is a very think frost covering everything. Despite it being cold there is no snow and none is forecast in the immediate future but with no wind there was some ice forming on Maridalsvannet.

We did not see the GG Shrike but it is still there as others are seeing it but it is clearly having to wander more widely to find food than it needed to previously. The Whooper Swan family was feeding on a frosty stubble field though and will most likely stay here until snow and/or a frozen lake push them on. An additional couple of Whooper Swans were out on the lake and these could have come from much further north.

The light today was very special as you will see in the photos. When the sun was behind a cloud everything looked black and white but when the sun was out and behind you then there were lovely warm colours against a blue sky.

There are still the occasional reports of Great Grey and Hawk Owls in Southern Norway and though obviously there is no large invasion underway there are clearly enough birds on the move that I still have hopes of turning one up.

here the sun is in front of us but behind a cloud causing a real sepia effect. See the swans?

 

with the low, warm winter sun behind me there is suddenly lots of colour

OsloBirder jr with the swans and the old buildings of Nes Gård (farm) in the background

thick frost covered everything today