The mountains - Valdres

We have had another long weekend and with good weather forecast on Saturday I decided to head to the mountains on Friday evening. Normally I would have had a boyz weekend in the mountains around this time but circumstances have conspired to mean that wouldn’t happen this year so I rather spur of the moment packed a sleeping bag in the car and headed off on my own. In the end I was out for 27 hours and had 2 hours of sleep, 30 minutes of which was a rather necessary power nap on the way home…

I surprised myself with how much energy I had although on the way home I was counting down the kilometres.

After 3 and a half hours driving I started the birding at my Great Snipe lek. After a blank last year I was hoping that was just a bit of bad luck but there were no birds again this year and I now reckon the lek has been abandoned. Why is more difficult to answer. It is close to a path and a ski lift but has always been so and I cannot see any changes in the immediate area that would affect the birds. The Beitostølen area has seen lots and lots of building of cabins but the lek is above the cabins, perhaps though the nesting females have always used areas that are now being developed and the general area is no longer attractive for them. Alternatively the species itself is suffering a significant decline due to factors in winter and passage areas and this has causes some leks to disappear as the birds concentrate in core areas. These are my maximum counts at the lek since I discovered it in 2012 and the downward trend is obvious:

the (former) lek site

 There were very few birds around the lek otherwise and the vegetation was still very brown. There was little snow and only lakes above 1300m had ice but I think this is from a warm period 2-3 weeks ago but since then it has been cold and windy so vegetation has not yet started developing.

I drove a long stretch of road during the night with frequent stops hoping to find Great Snipe other places but did not succeed. There was a lot of other life though. Between midnight and 1am I was surprised by how much activity there was from other waders and grouse and also a Short-eared Owl that perched in my headlights.

I had my hour and half sleep in the car and awoke at 3:30am to lots of noise. All manner of birds were singing and displaying and over the next 6 hours I feasted my eyes on Dotterels, Temminck’s Stints, Shore Larks, Lapland and Snow Buntings, Bluethroats, Long-tailed Ducks, Scaup, Common and Velvet Scoters and more. It is clearly not a rodent year in this area and aswell as no Long-tailed Skuas I just had a single Rough-legged Buzzard, another Short-eared Owl, 2 Kestrels, a Golden Eagle and a White-tailed Eagle.

 

After this as the sun warmed things up I concentrated on butterflies  and I took a slight detour to visit a site of the rare Large Grizzled Skipped (alvesmyger). I did at the time think I had found them but my pictures show I saw, or at least the ones I managed to photograph, were ordinary Grizzled Skippers which I didn’t realise occurred there. Their large cousins do fly later and the end of June is the time most people see them so I will have to try again later… I did have another good species but none were new for me so I am a bit disappointed but will I hope have a butterfly post soon.

Dotterel (boltit)

it was only displaying females that I saw but they were very active

Golden Eagle (kongeørn) and a mountain

I heard quite a few (although not lots of) Bluethroats (blåstrupe) but saw none at close range

I only had Lapland Buntings (lappspurv) at one site but 5! males were singing and song flighting within 100m of each other

a Ptarmigan (fjellrype) at 11pm

male Shore Lark (fjellerke)

and his mate

one of the two Short-eared Owls (jordugle) I saw

Snow Buntings (snøspurv) were unusually numerous this year

male

female

03:39 at my hotel

my now favoured raptor watch point was a bit disappointing this year with just 4 birds of 4 species: Golden Eagle, White-tailed Eagle, Rough-legged Buzzard and Kestrel

Maridalen terns

Maridalsvannet is not a classic locality for terns. The water is very deep and there is little vegetation along the sides or shallow bays. When water levels are low though and there are hatches of insects then it can attract a few terns to feed. These are normally Common Terns that are presumably visiting from their nesting colonies on the fjord although the length of time that birds visit suggests they are perhaps non breeders as it is quite the journey back to the fjord if you have a nest there.

Arctic Terns have proven to be more regular than previously realised or else they have become more regular and are now an expected annual guest with the timing making it sometimes difficult to know whether they are late spring migrants or early autumn migrants. Two records of Black Tern and of course the Gull-billed Tern on 10 June 2023 show that there is always potential for something rarer and more exciting.

This week has seen a hatch of insects and there have been lots of Common and Black-headed Gulls hawking insects and with them upto 8!! Arctic Terns and 4 Common Terns. We have had quite a few rain showers and one of these at least caused an arrival of Arctics (they increased from 5 to 8). With records of a Gull-billed and a number of Sandwich Terns to the south and a White-winged Black to the north I have of course been hoping to find something rarer myself and have also expected Little Gulls to turn up. They haven’t unfortunately but it has been fun observing all the different birds and it is always a challenge identifying Common and Arctic Tern. Anyone who says it is easy is either really good or lying. One of the Arctic’s has been present every day and is readily identifiable due to is missing one of its outer tail feathers and also showing signs of immaturity that have led me to age it is a 2^nd summer / 3^rd cy.

the 3cy Arctic Tern (rødnebbtern). All black bill, incomplete black hood and dark feathering on front of wing are all signs of immaturity

here you can also see it is missing (or maybe it hasn't grown out yet) its left outer tail feather

an adult Arctic

adult Arctic

and here an adult Common (makrellterne) and adult Arctic with a Black-headed Gull (hettemåke). In this grainy picture you can still see that the black line on the undersde of the primaries is narrower and more defined on the Arctic which is also a slight smaller bird

adult Common Tern here with the black tip to the bill also visible

all the terns were nearly always in flight but here the 3cy Arctic perched on a rock

same bird

same bird 

adult Arctic

Adult Arctic in fron of a ski jump - one of my signature shots ;-)

adult Arctic swooping for food

it is difficult to see what it caught - either a small fish or a large insect

the 3cy Arctic

adult Arctic

adult Common

Adult Common

adult Common

adult Common

adult Common

here catching a small fish

Local catch up

Migration is ending now in Oslo and nocturnal trips and breeding birds will be the focus.

Breeding waders seem to be having a reasonable season. In addition to the Ringed Plovers that I have previously detailed I have found a Little Ringed Plovers nest, a couple of Common Sandpiper nests, Snipe are displaying at 2 locations in Maridalen and Lapwings in Maridalen keep surprising and seem to be having a good season. They are difficult to keep track of as once the young hatch they move around and hide in grass but I am confident there are four broods of young but quite possibly five with the latest just a day old when I first saw them, a pair is still incubating and another pair have been displaying but not to my knowledge made a nesting attempt. Question now is how many young will fledge.

This is the oldest brood on 22 May when they were already half grown.

female Little Ringed Plover (dverglo) on her nest

LRP nest and eggs.

Common Sandpiper (strandsnipe) nest again with 4 eggs. I found this nest when there were only 3 eggs

another Common Sand nest. As there are only 3 eggs I assume another will be laid. This nest was in a field whereas the other in woodland

Common Rosefinches seem to continue to decline with none recorded so far in Maridalen and just a couple in their stronghold of Sørkedalen. Surprisingly though a couple of brown, 1st summer, males are at Fornebu though and I managed to record them singing together.

Many species seem to have young early this year with broods of Long-tailed Tits and Starlings already on the wing.

I have only seen 3 Red-backed Shrikes tornskate) so far this year but they often don't come in force until June

young Starling (stær) with one of its parents

a young Long-tailed Tit (stjertmeis)

Wrynecks (vendehals) are now mostly silent -  the ones who have paired up at least - and difficult to find