Tromsø in February rocks!

Our first mid winter trip to Tromsø has been a resounding success. We arrived at the end of Sami Week, an annual celebration of all things Sami, and got to see the Norwegian Championships in both lasso throwing and Reindeer racing. The reindeer racing happened on a snow lined downtown street on a 201m course. It was explained that 201m is the internationally defined distance for the sport but no explanation was given for why. A skier holds on to the reins whilst the animal runs and covers the distance in around 17 seconds. It all looked great fun although the animals didn’t exactly look thrilled whilst being harnessed up. Animal welfare was not mentioned once..

The Northern Lights also put on a show and this is one of the main reasons the City has become such a popular winter tourist destination and the streets were heaving with winter clothed tourists from ever corner of the globe. This tourism results in hotel prices going through the roof and rented accommodation being used for Air BnB rather than for locals or students who need it and is causing quite a lot of resentment among many natives.

I put on a «show» for the 100 or so students in Junior’s 8 storey high student block when whilst making food I slightly burnt some mince causing the smoke alarm to go off and the whole building to be evacuated. The fire brigade arrived within 10 minutes and were very good about it - I even think they were grateful to me for being given something to do on an otherwise boring Sunday evening ☺️

But what about the birds I hear you say. Well, they were tip top super. King Eiders and an adult Iceland Gull topped the bill and all seen whilst walking from Junior’s into town. Passerines are of course going to be in short supply in winter this far north but an abundance of rowan berries resulted in small flocks of Waxwing and and most surprisingly a Redwing which would be an exceptional mid winter sight even in Oslo.

The trusted superzoom and mobile phone resulted in the following documentation of the delights of Tromsø (this is done at the airport and I may come with some better edited photos later):

King Eider (praktærfugl) pair

Adult Iceland Gull (grønnlandsmåke)

Fieldfare (gråtrost)

Redwing (rødvingetrost)

I saw no divers in the field but this Yellow-billed was in Tromsø Museum

Where I also had my best ever «views» of a Gyr Falcon
(Jaktfalk)

According to accepted Norwegian birding wisdom Shags (toppskarv) never perch like this…

Purple Sandpiper (fjæreplytt)

Herons have been roosting in the heronry trees by Junior’s flat all winter and they were present and noisy when we were there

A close male Long-tailed Duck (havelle)

Stonechat, Iceland Gull and Hazel Grouse

Winter has returned and spring migration, what little of it there was, has stopped up. Temperatures are below zero 24/7 for the next week and will fall as low as -15C although no new snow is forecast.

I have still had some very good birding since my last post and really should blog more often so as to avoid such long posts.

On Friday I headed into the forest and despite the snow coming up to my knees in places I was able to get around quite easily and a close encounter with “my” Hazel Grouse pair was the my reward.

At the weekend Jr Jr was competing in a competition in Jessheim which is close to the Taiga Beans and with long gaps between her appearances I was able to pop down on both days. The flock on Saturday was unchanged from the 87 birds and 2 Pink-feet I had seen previously but on Sunday there were 86 Taigas and 3 Pink-feet, go figure.. I was able to read a leg ring (Y6) which I hadn’t seen before and also noted two birds with just metal rings, one on its left leg and the other on its right. There must be birds that have lost both collars and plastic colour leg rings. With the winter weather this week I will expect the river to (re)freeze over so it will be interesting to see if the geese head south for a bit.

Monday started well with a twitch of a Stonechat at Østensjøvannet that had been found on Saturday. It was a nice male that seemed to find some food but which will also suffer in the coming week if it tries to hang around

And today I made a short visit to the waterfront in Oslo to twitch an adult Iceland Gull which is the first time I have seen this age close to Oslo.

male Hazel Grouse (jerpe)

low shutter speeds in the daak forest can lead to some action picture

here it was about to nip off and eat the bid

Taiga Bean Geese

Y6

3 Pink-feet in this picture

male Stonechat

a very photogenic bird

spot the adult Iceland Gull (grønlandsmåke)

the first Whooper Swan (sangsvane) of the year back on Maridalsvannet. Is this one half of the breeding pair meaning perhaps that the other bird is no more?

the Great Grey Shrike (varsler) still turns up occasionally

Goldeneye (kvinand)

bathing Starlings (stær)

Værøy 2018 Day 3

The weather today was conducive to birding with no rain after 10am and little wind but there were no new passerines to find with one notable exception. Kjell (who else?) found a Red-flanked Bluetail but it was not seen properly by anyone else and not seen in any form by yours truly.

A 1^st winter Iceland Gull was new and showed very well and is a very early record and there were also some large, brown Redpolls which were probably also from Greenland/Iceland so the westerly winds have deposited some birds here (along with yesterday’s Redwing).

The good weather did allow us to find what was hanging around and I had 7 Yellow-browed Warblers along with Pied Fly, Lesser Whitethroat and Garden Warbler. Raptors were also up in the air and I had White-tailed and Golden Eagles, Merlin and Sparrowhawk.

Tomorrow is my last day and should be the best day based on the forecast so let’s hope it is.

snow fell overnight on the higher peaks in Lofoten (here looking north from Værøy)

the 1st winter Iceland Gull (grønnlandsmåke) in the surf

the outer webs of the primaries are dark which from memory might make this a kumliens

although look how on this picture the outer webs look pale

Merlin (dvergfalk)

Starling (stær)

adult White-tailed Eagle (havørn)

the obligatory shot of a Yellow-browed Warbler (gulbrynsanger)

Bar-tailed Godwit (lappspove)