Daddy's reward

The autumn half term holiday is drawing to an end and whilst Mrs OB and Jr went up to Tromsø, myself and Jr Jr checked into a hotel with swimming pool complex and playland. On the way back today I chose as a reward to myself the (very) scenic route back through farmland and forest where I was hoping to find Hawk Owl.

In the end the scenic route delivered some fine autumn birding including Hawkie and Jr Jr didn’t complain too much……

The first decent bird was a Golden Eagle. I had seen a couple of buzzards and stopped the car in a layby to check what type. They were Common and I was about to drive off but Jr Jr wanted something from the boot (OK she wanted sweets). Whilst closing the boot a raptor flew low over me. I thought Common Buzzard, raised the bins and thought the plumage didn’t quite fit and wondered if it was a dark and very late juv Honey Buzzard. It then started circling and it took quite a while before I realised it was a Golden Eagle….. I had completely failed to judge the size correctly initially and also with Golden Eagle being very unexpected I was not putting the (rather obvious) plumage characters into context. I even managed some pictures with the superzoom but by then it had already gained some height.

Golden Eagle (kongeørn). Aging eagles is not a skill I have mastered but this bird would appear to have moulted its inner primaries and with the otherwise juvenile look this should make it a 2cy bird

Continuing on I had a stop at Hærsetsjøen. This small, shallow lake was covered in geese as it usually is in late autumn. There must have been a couple of thousand Greylags and I scanned looking for something more exciting. A few Canadas and Barnacles were not difficult to find and 7 Pink-feet were standing on the mud but it took 3 sweeps through before I found some Bean Geese. 14 taiga (fabalis) in total was an interesting record. There are regular spring records of Taiga Beans here but only a few autumn records. There have been no records of collared/ringed birds here so they are probably not part of the Scottish/Swedish population but are probably birds from another subpopulation and this could well be a regular stop over site. The tagged birds have also already left Akershus. They departed sometime after 8am GMT (10am local time) on Sunday (2.10) and were over Northumberland by 8pm GMT and then by midnight GMT they were roosting at their traditional site at Fannyside east of Glasgow. A quite astonishing flight! Previous tagged birds have not made the flight in one. They have either stopped in Southern Norway, spent a few days in Northern England or even seemingly roosted on the North Sea.

 Amongst the geese there was just a single (blue) neck collar to read on a Greylag. I read it as NC6 and have entered it into geese.org but this has not been recorded before so either it is from a scheme that does not use geese.org which I think is unlikely as I have successfully reported similar collars before or I misread the ring but don’t know what it would have been otherwise (maybe the N was a Z?)

 

Four species of geese in this picture (Pink-feet standing, many Greylags, some obvious Barnacles and in the middle a few Taiga Beans)

an uncropped picture using the digital zoom with a couple of Beans in the middle

Hærsetsjøen - small but very important for wildfowl

The highlight of the day came at Hellesjøvannet where when I stopped at the northern end to count the Pochard I saw a bird perched on top of a telegraph pole. Even though I had seen a Hawk Owl on this exact pole in March2013 I was expecting to see a Kestrel today. BUT NO, it was HAWKIE!! Ringed birds in this autumns invasion have as far as I know been adults suggesting a failed breeding season and it could well be that that this bird is the exact same bird as was here in 2013 – who knows but an interesting thought. There must be loads more Hawkie to be had out there on the streets.

Hawkie!

Green-winged Teal ++

It will be May in just three days but at the moment it feels like winter. The continuing cold northerly wind has caused an almost complete stop in spring migration and a lack of rain has left fields dry and unappealing to birds. This means that a big backlog of birds is building up somewhere to the south of us and when the cork is removed we could be in for a real rush. Things might change quite soon as well with rain and a change to southerly winds forecast already this weekend although it will still be cold. Next week though there is forecast more southerlies and sun so there could also be a burst of insects and then loads more birds. Another upside from the current weather is that Svellet is almost dry so should be in prime condition in the next two weeks....

To highlight how late things are, during today's Aurskog-Høland trip I didn't have a single hirundine, only one (my first) Willow Warbler, one Wheatear and only a single Golden Plover. Also not a single tringa wader other than Green Sands. That's not to say the trip was not a success - far from it. One of my target birds on my two previous trips out east this spring was Green-winged Teal. I didn't find one (finding multiple Garganey instead) but two days ago one was found at Hærsetersjøen which is one of the sites I always visit. At 0645 I was there and so was the teal! This is most likely the same returning male I found in 2013 at Kjelle and 2014 at Hellesjøvannet (and which was seen in 2015 at Hemnessjøen). It was together with 107 Teal and very easy to find. Otherwise, the lake and its muddy margins held two Lapwing and a Snipe and that’s it.

Hærsetersjøen and Kallaksjøen are just over an hour’s drive Oslo and these were my first stops before slowly heading back to Oslo. I did have one roadside stop though in an area where Rune and I once had a chance meeting with a Capercaille. This time I was fortuitous enough to hear displaying Black Grouse and drumming Three-toed Woodpecker!

Hemnessjøen was very quiet and I didn't see a single diver! A small flock of Greylags though contained three Pink-feets, two Canadas and most unexpectedly a Tundra (rossicus) Bean Goose.
Hellesjøvannet was also very quiet on the wildfowl and wader front. Lapwings here (as in Maridalen and other places today) had clearly had their first breeding attempt ruined by ploughing but should hopefully try again (I think farmers are ploughing late this year due to the (dry?) weather). The two male Marsh Harriers were still present and the younger male has attracted a mate who was putting the finishing touched to the nest he had made. At one time the older male flew over the nest and was seen off by his younger and clearly more successful rival. I also heard a Grey-headed Woodpecker both calling and drumming but didn’t see it – not a species I see annually in Akershus.

At the northern end of Bjørkelangen the flooded field was no longer flooded but a small group of geese contained yet another Tundra Bean Goose – what’s going on?

At Kjelle there is very little water left and only 11 Teal. The rain at the weekend though should hopefully improve conditions for next week. The valley around Haugrim and Haneborg gave the most frustrating bird of the day with a distant ringtail harrier glimpsed briefly in the bins and she had a Pallid reek about her but I never got her in the scope and will have to let her go. A Perched Merlin was little compensation.

Svellet has too little water!! although the weekend rains will probably change that. 103 Curlew and 8 Oystercatcher were the only waders and there was not a single duck!

Maridalen was as equally quiet as yesterday. But what will there be tomorrow???

male Green-winged Teal (amerikakrikkand) with European Teal (krikkand). It was not paired

no head but still eminently identifiable

you could still make a tentative ID based on the lack of a horizontal white bar

 

 

 

some of the103 Curlew (storspove) at Svellet after a Peregrine put them up

Curlews and Black-headed Gulls Svellet

a very dry Svellet

I came very close to a pair of Kestrels (tårnfalk) by the road but did not manage any good photos

Kjelle drying out

Merlin (dvergfalk). A 2cy male I believe

one of the two Tundra (rossicus) Bean Geese today

my first Willow Warbler (løvsanger) of the year

Little Ringed Plover (dverglo)

one of two Pink-footed Geese (kortnebbgås) currently at Maridalen. I believe one has problems flying

And a highlights video featuring both the Tundra Beans, Merlin, Little Ringed Plover, all three Marsh Harriers and a strange pale Teal that may have been an "intersex" bird


 

 

 

terrible picture of the pale Teal but you get the idea

 

Quite a few geese

South east Norway at this time of the year has a limited birdlife but there can be some concentrations of geese and swans with a chance of finding something scarcer amongst them. One good place is Hærsetsjøen just over the border in Østfold. I left the house early to get there for dawn and on the drive had a Pygmy Owl on a roadside wire. When I arrived the small lake was overflowing with geese. 2500 Greylags was a huge number! I was convinced there would White-fronted or Bean Geese amongst them or even a Lesser White-front but apart from 210 Pink-feets there were no other species - unbelievable!  It would be very interesting to know the origin of these Greylags. I saw no neck rings which I have seen amongst flocks of moulting Greylags around Oslo which suggests these are not local birds. A few Teal were the only ducks and 82 Whooper Swans held no smaller cousins.

I continued by returning into Akershus and checking out Hemnessjøen which was quiet and Hellesjøvsannet which apart from a good count of 5 Smew was also very quiet. I had hoped to find Bearded Tits at the extensive reedbeds at both these sites but heard none.

Raptors were very scarce today with just single Buzzard and Goshawk and surprisingly I had only a single Great Grey Shrike. With so few concentrations of birds to see I ended up back in Oslo with time to spare and went to Fornebu. Here the Kingfisher was again present in Storøykilen but this time I nailed it down and watched it for over an hour during which it caught fish at least three times and looked to be very happy with its lot - if we have a mild winter it may even survive although chances of that are slim.

Hærsetsjøen

some of the Greylag Geese (grågjess)

a few Whooper Swans (sangsvane) today but no Bewick's

Kingfisher (isfugl) again. Still always a long way off



the turquoise back casting a reflection in the water