An attempt at a seawatch

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

Regular Oslo birding this week

Birding in Oslo isn’t just Sibes and owls and there are more normal birds to look at and enjoy. A large arrival of Waxwings is brewing although so far most birds I have seen have been flocks hurrying over. There seems to be lots of berries around though so once the birds settle down then I am sure there will be lots of urban birds to enjoy.

Maridalen has been rather quiet with a Great Grey Shrike appearing in many different parts of the valley signalling that food is difficult to find. On the lake there have been quiet a few wind blown Guillemots and amongst them I picked out a Razorbill which is only the third record in the Dale. Nocturnal trips have revealed a few Woodcock although numbers are declining with birds presumably continuing their southbound migration.

I have been out looking for owls twice more but with disappointing results. A trip with Jr and the Beast gave two Tawny Owls but a trip with Jack drew a complete blank which lends some weight to the saying that “a Jack a day keeps the birds away” 😉

Østensjøvannet is normally a productive place in October and there are lots of birds this year but it is a very different make up to the last few years when there has been a lot of water weed which has attracted three figure flocks of Coot, Mute Swan and Wigeon. This year there seems to have been a complete die back of the water weed and the lake is nearly free of the above species with for example only single figures of Coot! Fish eating species however are in higher numbers especially Herons and Cormorants. The commonest birds though are geese which are feeding on a stubble feed and in total there are close to 1000 Barnacle, Greylag and Canada Geese although surprisingly enough nothing scarce amongst them.

Fornebu is very quiet with visits this week revealing nothing of note with colder temperatures and overnight frosts having pushed warblers and pipits onwards.

A trip to Årnestangen was also disappointing although 9 Taiga Bean Geese with Greylags was as always a nice encounter and a small flock of Twite was my first of the autumn.

this young Goshawk (hønsehauk) was a delight at Østensjøvannet today and was respectfully escorted out of the area by the local Hooded Crows. Its large size indicates it is a female

a Jackdaw (kaie) also got in on the act

when the geese at Østensjøvannet take to the wing it is an impressive sight and sound

The only Mute Swans (knoppsvane) are breeding birds that haven't left yet. The young in this family are still far from full grown and seem to have developed slowly due to the shortage of food. In addition there are 3 orphaned young (the dad was found dead and mum just disappeared) which are also not yet able to fly and a single adult that had apparantly crashed with overhead wires

a redhead Smew (lappfiskand) - one of two at Østensjøvannet

Twite (bergisisk) at Årnestangen

a Razorbill (alke) on Maridalsvannet

and the valley's Great Grey Shrike (varsler) hovering as it looks for food

a Tawny Owl (kattugle) perched on a wire in the Dale. 

and a Woodcock (rugde)

last week I sea gazed at Krokstrand. There wasn't much to see (what did I really expect) except for a flock of 95 Kittikwakes (krykje) that suddenly appeared heading north at height

Shaking it up...

Since my last post I have shaken things up a bit and left the Dale on two, yes two, occasions! On Wednesday I walked along the waterfront in Oslo with the main aim of seeing the Iceland Gull. After seven previous unsuccessful attempts to see this bird I had decided I wouldn’t try again but after it was seen two days in a row along the waterfront downtown I thought that it had settled down. Maybe it has but I still couldn’t find it… There was very little of interest otherwise although the young male Pintail (with very delayed moult) was on the fjord with some Mallards and has now been seen at four widely spread localities in the city in January.

On Thursday night most of Norway was hit by a big storm and with the winds forecast to reach up to 25m/s and directly from the south I headed out on Friday morning to my favoured sea gazing location of Krokstrand. Well the wind was not even 10m/s and there weren’t even with tops to the waves so unsurprisingly there were few birds. Lots of Common Gulls heading south were perhaps birds displaced overnight by the storm, but the only seabirds were a single Kittiwake, Red-throated Diver and three Guillemots.

I have of course visited the Dale as well and here the birding has been hard at times. Temperatures rose mid week and there came first lots of new wet snow and then rain and wind. This must create very difficult conditions for the rodent eaters but the two Common Buzzards are both to be seen as are a couple of Hawk Owls and the Great Grey Shrike. The Pygmy Owl only gave up its presence by singing unseen in the distance one day.

Yesterday the weather turned again and we have glorious blue skies. Mrs OB and I took the Beast for a walk and sat down in a clearing to eat clementines and enjoy the view when suddenly a Hawk Owl appeared in front of us! It was glorious light and the moon was even up in the sky allowing me to take that clichéd shot of an owl in front of the moon although admittedly they look better in silhouette at night.

1st winter male Pintail (stjertand) in very delayed moult

the localities where it has been seen in 2021

a Guillemot (lomvi) with a very dark face (for mid Jan). Such birds are often mistaken for Brunnich's Guillemot which is a real rarity in Southern Norway

the pale Common Buzzard (musvåk) that is still in Maridalen. This bird superficially resembles a Rough-legged Buzzard (fjellvåk)

same bird - note how white it is on the body

caught in an unusual position

the darker bird

Hawkie in the sun

I was waiting for the bird to fly when I noticed the sun in the background and changed my photo plans

Jays (nøtteskrike) often discover owls and give them grief although it is rare that I manage to capture it

Free to gaze

My Covid quarantine has come to end and I was able to extend the radius for today’s exercise/birding. In the end there was no exercise as I just stared at the sea at Krokstrand and then took in some drive-by sites on the way home. I knew that the wind wasn’t strong enough but I still harbour a hope of finding a Leaches Petrel which remains the most glaring absence to my Norwegian list and there have been some storm driven birds further south in Sweden in the last few days. There was of course no petrel or phalarope, or skua or shearwater and not even a Gannet or Fulmar but 11 Kittiwakes allowed themselves to be blown north by the wind and made it feel a bit seawatchy. When the 1cy birds go through at speed it is very easy to try to string a Sabine’s Gull which is something of a popular pastime in southern Norway each autumn. Documented flyby Sabines Gulls are an extremely rare occurrence in Norway despite birds often being described as having flown past at "close range" or having been "seen really well feeding offshore" so it was very refreshing to see nice pictures of an undisputed one recently.

Auks were the most numerous birds today with Guillemots in the majority along with a few Razorbills and best of all I had a Puffin which flew north with a couple of Guillemots. Despite being a common breeder along northern coastlines, Puffin is nearly as rare as Sabines Gull in the Oslofjord. I did not get a photo… 😉

One entertaining sighting was a young Peregrine that attacked a couple of flying Guillemots and when they flashed through the telescope field of view I assumed I was watching a marauding skua. The falcon was unsuccessful in his hunt and in the end flew inland. I also had a Sparrowhawk flying low over the water and for not the first time it took quite a few seconds to work out what I was looking at.

On the way home I added Common Buzzard and Kestrel to my raptor tally.

 

My eBird checklist for Krokstrand can be seen here.

over wintering Kestrels (tårnfalk) are less than annual close to Oslo so this bird was yet another sign of the ample numbers of rodents

I don't know how to age and sex Kestrels other than adult males but believe that the streaking rathen than spotting on the underparts makes this a 1cy