An update from Oslo

Autumn has arrived. The end of July and beginning of August is a very quiet period as breeding birds are all undergoing post breeding or post juvenile moults and almost disappear from view. Now though moult is finished and suddenly there is a lot of activity from the local birds plus obvious migrants are now turning up. I have now found Red-backed Shrikes with young in three locations in Maridalen pus the unpaired singing male which means it has been a record year for the species (never more than one pair before and it isn’t every year I find them breeding). Spotted Flycatchers and Tree Pipits also seem to have had a good year. The first (obvious) migrants that are turning up are Yellow Wagtails, Meadow Pipits and Whinchats.

Raptors are also becoming more visible and a morning visit to Maridalen today revealed Honey and Common Buzzard, Hobby and Osprey.

adult female Honey Buzzard (vepsevåk) with prey (presumably a wasps nest). She gained height and flew a few kilometres to the east towards an area where they have been a number of records of the species this summer and where there must be a nest

here with a Swallow

and a Swift

a Painted Lady (neslesommerfugl)

Red-backed Shrike (tornskate) - here the male and a youngster from the third breeding pair I have found in Maridalen this year

and here mum

There are a lot of flycatchers in Maridalen at the moment. On the left are two Spotted Flycatchers (gråfluesnapper) and on the right a Pied Flycatcher (svarthvit fluesnapper). I belive all to the 1cy birds with the bottom left bird still in juvenile plumage whereas the other two have moulted to 1st winter.

Queen of Spain Fritillary (sølvkåpe)

Whooper Swans (sangsvane)

I child and dog walking trip to Fornebu this afternoon did not reveal many birds but there were a few dragons and butters to see

This is yet another new species of dragonfly for me: a Migrant Hawker / septemberlibelle / aeshna mixta. This species was first noted in Norway as recently as 2004 but has established itself including at Fornebu

there were quite a lot of small red dragonflies and I would normally assume they were all the same species but the all black legs show this one to be a Ruddy Darter / blodhøtlibelle / sympetrum sanguineum 

and the pale backs to the legs plus black mark on side of eye show this to be a Vagrant Darter / sørhøstllibelle / sympetrum vulgatum although this species is very similar to the Common Darter / senhøstlibelle / s. stroilatum

and here a Common Ble Damselfly /innsjøvannymfe / enallagma cyathigerum

and a female Emerald Damselfly / nordmetallvannymfe / Lestes sponsa

and here a male

and finally a Common Blue (tiriltungeblåvinge) which is unusual in that it doesn't have any large spots (showing) near the base of the upperwing

New birds from no where

Today didn’t feel like a special day but with 8 new species for the year it clearly was good! Anders and I headed to Nordre Øyeren and visited Svellet, Merkja, Tuentangen and Snekkervika. It never felt like there was any avian activity with the high pressure still ruining things but there were birds here and there and my year ticks were: Greenshank, Common Sandpiper, Jack Snipe, Little Ringed Plover, Whinchat, Redstart, Willow Warbler and Swallow. We also had 10 species of wader which is a sign of things to come. In addition to the 4 mentioned above we had Golden Plover, Curlew, Oystercatcher, Snipe, Lapwing and Green Sandpiper. Svellet is looking very promising but needs some rain and a slight increase in water levels as it is very dry at the moment and there were only 11 Curlew. The whole of Snekkervika was dry to beyond the end of Årnetangen and with heat haze it was hopeless to see what was out there. Raptors disappointed as we had hoped for some harriers and we only saw upto 6 different Kestrels, 4 Buzzards, 2 Sparrowhawk and an Osprey.

There were 400 Teal on Merkja but a pair of Pintail was the only interest among them although we did find a male Garganey at Tuentangen alongside just 10 Teal.

Luckily there were not too many photos to go through today (it’s much quicker that way..)

male Garganey (knekkand)

male Whinchat (buskskvett)

male Redstart (rødstjert)

Queen of Spain Fritillary (sølvkåpe). This is my first early spring record of a species that is rapidly increasing in Norway and used to be more of a summer migrant

Jack Snipe (kvartbekkasin)

Green-veined White (rapssommerfugl)

Little Ringed Plover (dverglo)

Svellet with two Greenshank (gluttsnipe)

The islands

Well I didn’t do it. Instead of visiting Årnestangen and Nordre Øyeren five days on the trot I decided to visit Oslo’s islands. Mid September must be the best time to find something interesting out there but it is rare that I visit them on what would be the best days weather-wise as I normally prioritise a trip to Årnestangen when the weather looks good (i.e. rain and wind). Today’s trip was far from optimal with a trip out on Monday or Tuesday having been far more likely to produce an interesting wader whilst by today the birds have now had three days without rain in which to move on.

I was not disappointed though and at least nice weather meant I could take some nice photos. Before taking the boat I looked for the King Eider although failed to find him. There are still lots of Common Eiders in the area so he is probably still around and many of the male Commons are coming back into breeding plumage so we can just hope that we will also be able to see the King in a plumage more fitting of his name. A Razorbill though was a sure sign of autumn.

The boat trip out revealed a 1^st winter Arctic Tern which is a good Oslo bird and on Gressholmen I chalked up an impressive three species of wader with two young Dunlin showing ridiculously well and a Greenshank and Redshank feeding together. A few Chiffchaffs with slightly strange and exciting calls had me hoping that a Yellow-browed Warbler would turn up but if course it didn’t.

On Lindøya there were still 15 or so Common Terns that were joining Cormorants and large gulls in feeding in a frenzy offshore that was presumably caused by larger predatory fish rounding up a smaller species. Most of the terns were youngsters and they are all fending for themselves now. The juvenile Red-necked Grebe was still present and showed at close range.

On Nakkholmen I had a juvenile Bar-tailed Godwit which is, I think, only my second Oslo record, a Redstart which is a species that always gets my pulse racing and an Osprey that revealed its presence by calling.

Back home I had a garden tick with a long overdue (especially given its name) Garden Warbler. It was feeding on elder berries that normally attract Blackcaps later in the autumn. This year the bush is heaving with berries so will be worth keeping an eye on.

It is only 6 days until I am on Værøy and Tore Berg who is already there had 48 Yellow-browed Warblers and 2 OBPs yesterday so it sounds like it will be good!

juvenile Red-necked Grebe (gråstrupedykker)

juvenile Bar-tailed Godwit (lappspove) with Oystercatcher (tjeld)

a slightly unsual location for both species

Two juvenile/1cy Common Terns (makrellterne)

one of them having a scratch

juvenile Dunlin (myrsnipe) moulting into winter plumage

Greenshank (gluttsnipe) and Redshank (rødstilk)

Osprey (fiskeørn). Andreas Gullberg photographed hte same bird (broken 4th finger on right wing) over his house 50 minutes earlier. Andreas has managed to age as an adult and sex as a male and I believe him but need to do a bit of reading up as I previously have never gone further than ID to species...

Red-breasted Merganser (siland)

Queen of Spain Fritillaries (sølvkåpe) are still going strong

1st winter White Wagtail (linerle)

and an adult already moulting into winter plumage

the garden's first Garden Warbler

New Bazooka

The Bazooka is dead, long live the bazooka!

My Sigma 150-500mm which has served me well for 6 years or so was on its last legs (optical stabiliser broken and the zoom locked on 150mm) so instead of a costly repair I decided to upgrade. The Canon 550D which is even older is still working fine but is so outdated that it too deserved an upgrade.

I like to keep with what I know so the new lens is a Sigma 150-600mm and the camera a Canon 77D. Both of these are relatively cheap but will offer a major improvement on my previous (not too bad) photographic endeavours.

From my first use I can see that autofocus is much faster, the lens is sharp at lower f stops meaning I can use much faster shutter speed and the exposure is significantly better. So, all in all it looks like I have chosen well whilst keeping within the budget of a poor bird guide :-)

Birding the last two days has seen a (relative) raptor bonanza. Yesterday at Årnestangen I had eight raptors of eight species (so not exactly numerous) and then added an extra species (Honey Buzzard) in Maridalen. Amazingly enough these species did not include Common Buzzard which is the commonest raptor in these parts! I did add Common Buzzard in Maridalen today though (where I had six raptors of five species) so ten species in two days ain't bad going. The species were White-tailed Eagle (a sub ad), Marsh Harrier, Hen Harrier (my first of the autumn), Osprey, Honey Buzzard, Common Buzzard, Peregrine, Kestrel, Sparrowhawk and Goshawk. Even though ten species is very good going there is still a chance for more as Hobby, Merlin and Rough-legged Buzzard should all be possible now and not to mention that Pallid Harrier..

Here are a few pictures taken with the Bazooka II. The light was pretty poor and I still haven’t got the hang of all settings etc but think it is going to be good.

male Southern Hawker (blågrønnlibelle)

Greylag Goose

Jay

mating Common Darters (senhøstlibelle)

a few Queen of Spain Fritillaries (sølvkåpe) are still going strong

this picture shows of a white bird in flight would not have been possible with the old bazooka

I was a bit rushed with this photo of one of Maridalen's two juvenile Black-throated Divers (storlom) which were having flying practice today. There has also been a juvenile Red-throated Diver together with an adult although these did not breed on the lake but close by on a small lake in the forest