Today actually started yesterday at 10pm when we went with Lars Bo to catch nightjars (natraven). Pernille and Rasmus also came in the hope of seeing these cool birds. At first we were a little bit disappointed because last time we had been we heard several singing even before sunset whereas this night we didn’t hear any singing at all at first. We had to set up the nets based on where we thought was good locations but it soon became clear that we chose the good places: even while we were setting up the nets, Rasmus, Pernille and I saw at least two nightjars fly around very close to us. It was the first nightjars that Rasmus had seen, so he was very happy. Then we put on the playback and waited.

Simon came out to say good-bye to me and in the hope to see a nightjar but had to wait for a while for his first. He was just about to leave when we finally caught one male. Rasmus junior and Pernille were really happy as it was the first time they had held one. Simon left and then we caught two more nightjars in one net check. One male and one female. The female had an egg that you could actually feel in her belly. It must be a second clutch that she started, either because the first clutch already fledged or because it was lost. We hope for the first option, of course.

After the ringing we came home at around 5 am and everybody went to sleep. I went to the tip in the hope of seeing ringed sandwich terns (splitterne) before but there weren’t any. I think probably the many tourists stop them from roosting on our beach now. They only come when the bad weather keeps the tourists away. There were several seals, some common terns, gulls, plovers (stor præstekrave), and a red-throated diver (rødstrubet lom), which was nice enough. Also just offshore there was a large group of at least 300 black scoters (sortand) roosting in the water which is the biggest flock I have seen here.

After that I went home to sleep as well. In the afternoon we did some maintenance work on the nets and antenna but nothing too exciting.

I will leave tomorrow, after having been here for almost two months. It has been an amazing two months that is hard to put into words. I met a lot of interesting people, learned how the birding community here in Skagen works and wish that it would work like this elsewhere. I saw so many cool birds and ringed many of them. I also became famous without wanting to. I guess things like that just happen to you. Me, I love terns and shorebirds, so being able to watch the sandwich terns through the window all day long as they take the fish they catch around the tip towards their chicks on Hirsholm is by far the best thing about this place. But the experience here has just been phenomenal due to the whole mix of everything, the landscape, the people, the seabirds and the birds in the ringing, even the raptors, and somehow also even the rails. I would much rather be remembered as the girl who loved the terns so much she would talk about nothing else all day long and couldn’t concentrate on the Vikings game when there were terns flying by, than the girl that discovered the lille rørvagtl but I guess different people have different priorities…

It would be really hard to explain to people who have not been here, why you choose to go out birdwatching in the evening and then still get up at 2.15 in the morning to open the nets while you get eaten (or drunk) by mosquitos and do that for weeks on end but this place and everything about it is just so special you want to make use of every hour you have even if it means you don’t sleep enough for two months straight. I guess if it costs me a few weeks of my life time then the energy was well invested. I won’t try to explain and I know that pictures can only give you a little glimpse of the reality up here but there are no words, nor pictures to describe the experience here. The only way is to come and see for yourself. As far as I am concerned, Simon already knows that he will have to put up with me again next year. I am already looking forward to coming back!

It remains to say thanks to everybody who made my experience here so memorable and enjoyable. I will miss it all – but especially the terns!

Ringmærkning (Sandmilen):

Natraven - Nightjar - 3

Folk: Martina Hillbrand, Simon S. Christiansen, Amandine Doré, Rasmus Matthlesen-duhl, Lars Bo Jacobsen, Pernille Roed

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

This morning, we went ringing at Kabeltromlen under a very sunny weather ! And for the first times in many days, there was no wind, which felt very nice ! A lot of birdwatchers were at Kabeltromlen this morning, hoping to hear or see the Zitting Cisticiola (Cistussanger) that had been sighted by Rolf yesterday. However, we did not hear it during the morning.

The catching was slower than yesterday, but we still got again a lot of juvenile birds, especially Common Whitethroat (Tornasanger), Lesser whitethroat (Gaerdesanger) and Chiffchaff (Gransanger).

We also ringed a juvenile Black Redtsart (Husrødstjert) and a Spotted Flycatcher (Grå fluesnapper), species that we do not catch so often !

I had to the ringing leave earlier for a meeting at the lighthouse, and let Martina close alone, which was harder than she thought because they were a lot of birds in the last rounds !

In the afternoon, I went out with Knud to try again to find the camera at the Cormorant Lake, that needed to be checked because it does not seem to work anymore. Knud knew the way, but still it was not easy to find it ! After some time walking and crossing reeds beds and bushes, we finally got to the camera ! It was actually also a very nice place to watch the cormorants (Skarv) and get close to them.

Into the danish jungle...

On my way back, I went to do some checkings on the antenna and tried to protect it from the playful cows in the field, that forced us to take down the receiver around 2 weeks ago.

In the end of the afternoon, Martina and Pernille went to the Cormorant lake to count the chicks. Most of them are now fully grown and have adult size. It becomes harder and harder to distinguish them from the adults, and it seems that some have already left the nest. Doing the counting and aging of the chicks becomes more challenging now ! The chicks of the Wtestern part of the colony were numerous and look healthy, which is good to see after the unfortunate killing of the chicks from the Eastern part of the colony.

A new volunteer, Rasmus, who had been here for a week last year, arrived today for a 2 weeks internship in the observatory.

After a nice dinner prepared by Rasmus and Pil, we are now getting ready to go catching nightjars (Natravn) again with Lars Bo. Hopefully, this night will as successful as the previous one and will try to beat the record of 5 nightjars in a night ! Lars Bo predicted 7 nightjars and 1 woodcock (Skovsneppe), and I hope he’s right !

Ringmærkning (Kabeltromlen):

Great tit – Musvit – 7

Black Redstart - Husrødstjert  - 1

Reed Warbler – Kærsanger – 2

Spotted Flycatcher - Grå Fluesnapper – 1

Lesser Whitethroat -      Gærdesanger – 8

Reed warbler – Rørsanger – 1

Blackcap – Munk – 5

Common Whitethroat – Tornsanger – 8

Blue tit – Blåmejse – 1

Chiffchaff – Gransanger – 5

Total : 39

People: Martina Hillbrand, Simon S. Christiansen, Amandine Doré, Rasmus, Pil, Falke, Sally, Rasmus Matthlesen-duhl, Rolf Christensen, Knud Pedersen, Lars Bo Jacobsen, Jørgen Kabel, and Igor

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

After a day full of first year whitethroats (tornsanger) today we had a little bit more colour in our ringing. We opened the nets at the usual time, half an hour before sunrise and had a very busy first net check (which is unusual). Part of the reason for this was probably very young birds taking their flying exercises in the early morning – or so it seemed, because we caught two blackbirds (solsort) that could barely fly and this yellowhammer (gulspurv) which has probably only just jumped out of the nest.

The day continued with some more unusual birds, showing that the breeding season is getting to an end and birds are starting to move around more. This stonechat still in its juvenile plumage probably fledged around two weeks ago somewhere south of here and had to leave the territory of the parents so it came up north to visit us. It was apparently only the second one caught in Skagen.

We also caught an adult male Linnet (tornirisk) brought some colour to our nets.

For the rest we still had a lot of juvenile whitethroats and chiffchaffs (gransanger) showing that the breeding success seems to have been pretty good. Also we had the first juvenile wren (gærdesmutte) and the regulars like baby blue and great tit (blåmejse og musvit) and blackbirds (solsort). Pil came out early to visit us at the ringing which was a good choice because that way she got to see a lot of birds.

While we were ringing, we suddenly heard the message from Rolf on Zello about a Zitting Cisticola (cistussanger!). It is hard to believe that a non-migratory bird that lives in the Mediterranean region would end up in Skagen but we could hear it again afterwards and by the evening there was a recording of the call as proof.

Trine, a veterinary from Aalborg Zoo and Aalborg University came to visit us during the day. She was very interested in the work we are doing and we hope to maybe collaborate with her in the future on some projects.

Back at the lighthouse we had a ringing tour with so many people it was split up according to languages (Danish and German). Everybody seemed to be very interested in our work and luckily they also got to see a single icterine warbler (gulbug) being ringed.

In the office part of the day we had a nice surprise from Belgium: a bird that we had caught on April 4^th with a Belgium ring on was finally reported back to us: it was a dunnock (jernspruv) which was ringed at the end of October in Belgium as a first year bird.

Ringmærkning (Kabeltromlen and Lighthouse Garden):

Munk – Blackcap – 2

Rørsanger – Reed Warbler – 4

Gærdesanger – Lesser Whitethroat – 3

Blåmejse – Blue Tit – 2

Lille Gråsisken – Redpoll – 2

Musvit – Great Tit -4

Gulbug – Icterine Warbler – 2

Gransanger – Chiffchaff - 5

Tornsanger – Common Whitethroat – 10

Kærsanger – Marsh Warbler – 1

Solsort – Blackbird – 1

Gærdesmutte – Wren – 1

Tornirisk – Linnet – 1

Sortstrubet Bynkefugl – Stonechat – 1

Karmindompap – Rosefinch – 1

Rørspurv – Reed Bunting – 1

Gulspruv – Yellowhammer – 1

Total: 42

Folk: Martina Hillbrand, Simon S. Christiansen, Amandine Doré, Rasmus, Pil, Falke, Sally, Erik Christopherson, Rolf Christensen, Jørgen Kabel, Trine Hammer Jensen, and Igor

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

After several days of bad weather, we finally went out catching again at Kabeltromlen. Martina had just openened the nets on the north side, when she saw a quite uncommon bird in the wader nets... We brought it back to the ringing table: it was a Wood sandpiper (Tinksmed) ! This was the first time that the species was caught in Grenen !

This Wood Sandpiper was a juvenile: on the wing, you can see that all (almost all) the feathers are from the same generation (in adults, feathers are from different generations) and the spots on the secondaries and tertials are buff, while in adults these spost would be white.

The morning went on, and we caught quite a few birds. There were a lot of juvenile birds, especially Common Whitethroats (Tornsanger) and Great tits (Musvit). We also caught our first juvenile Bullfinch (Dompap). 

Other highlights of the morning were a beautiful male Yellowhammer (Gulspurv) and a Black Redstart (Husrødstjert). 

In the afternoon, we tried to see a Bonelli's eagle that had been spotted south of Skagen, but the bird eventually didn’t not fly through Grenen and we didn’t get to see it. We also went out to try to do some migrating seabirds counts but unfortunately we did not see much.

In the evening we had a very nice ”danish summer” dinner prepared by Rasmus and Pil. It was delicious !

Ringmærkning (Kabeltromlen):

Lille Dompap – Bullfinch – 3

Munk – Blackcap – 2

Rørsanger – Reed Warbler – 4

Gærdesanger – Lesser Whitethroat – 5

Blåmejse – Blue Tit – 1

Lille Gråsisken – Redpoll – 3

Musvit – Great Tit -5

Gulbug – Icterine Warbler – 1

Tinksmed – Wood Sandpiper - 1

Gransanger – Chiffchaff - 2

Tornsanger – Common Whitethroat – 13

Husrødstjert – Black Redstart – 1

Total: 41

Folk: Martina Hillbrand, Simon S. Christiansen, and Amandine Doré

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

The strong winds are starting to get annoying not only for the ornithologists but also for the birds. The ornithologists can benefit from birds being blown off course but in fact we would really like to go out ringing again but the winds make it impossible to open the nets. Hopefully tomorrow.

After the red-throated diver (rødstrubet lom) from last week that stayed for a few days probably exhausted and could apparently gather enough strength to leave again, last night I found a black guillemot (tejst) on the beach just outside the lighthouse. It also seemed exhausted but we could not catch it so hopefully it will recover on its own.

This morning I went out to look for Sandwich terns (splitterne) again, however, I couldn’t find any. Not even feeding. I assume that the fact that the sandy beach has decreased so much with all the water being blown our way and the ever increasing number of tourists at the beach, the sandwich terns do not find enough peace to roost here any more. We hope that they will come back when the strong winds stop.

In the afternoon we had a bird ringing tour despite the strong winds and there were a lot of people, also children. We were lucky enough to catch a single bird during the tour so they could also experience the actual ringing of a bird. It was a great experience for them, I am sure.

Afterwards I went to the cormorant (skarv) colony for the weekly monitoring. We had half feared that more nests might have been predated, however the chicks on the western side were all alive and are by now almost the size of the adults. Some are only distinguishable from immature birds by the brown feathers on their throat, head, and underparts. The wings seem almost fully grown and they also start to leave the nest and climb around the trees a little bit. Soon they will probably start to learn to fly!

Apart from the outdoor activities our email inbox was quite exciting today: We got news on two birds! Finally we heard from the Gannet (sule) that we caught injured on north beach 2 weeks ago. It was ringed as a chick in July 2014 at the west coast of England.

Another notice was regarding a willow warbler (løvsanger) that Michael ringed as a juvenile bird probably on migration in August 2018. It has been found dead in Norway three weeks ago.

Ringing at Fyrhavn:

Tree Pipit - Skovpiber - 1

Folk: Martina Hillbrand, Simon S. Christiansen, and Amandine Doré

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

The very strong winds and frequent showers stopped us from going ringing at Kabeltromlen this morning... Instead we went out to Grenen to count the Sandwich Terns (Splitterne), which were roosting at the tip.

However, the Terns were very nervous, and flying away easily, probably because of the weather. Martina tried to read some rings, however she did not manage because we could not get very close.

Sandwich (Splitterne) and Common Tern (Fjordterne) next to each other: Sandwich Terns are bigger, have black legs and black bill with yellow tips while Commonterns are smaller, have red leg and red bill with a black tip. 

We went back home early, and did some office work during the day.

Grenen tip under water....

Tonight, we will try to go out at Grenen tip to catch some terns, as Simon got new powerful flashlights. Our first attempt at catching waders at night was a failure, but this time we'll try to do better !

More on that tomorrow in the blog !

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

After the late night ringing yesterday with more birds than expected we opened the nets again this morning hoping to catch many more birds despite the rather difficult weather forecast. We were not quite sure how long we could stay open before the rain but hoped for some birds in any case. We were a little disappointed by a rather slow start but just as the rain came and we had to close the nets we had a very nice surprise: finally the newly set up wader net caught its first bird: the very common snipe (dobbeltbekkasin) that had successfully evaded the net so many times before! We could finally ring it and now hope to get an answer to the question whether it is still alone and looking for a mate or if the song flights are to defend its territory and it is long breeding with a partner. Of course, we are hoping for lots of baby snipes in the near future!

Also in the last net check we got this beautiful adult male redpoll (lille gråsisken).

After we closed because of the rain I went to the tip to take advantage of the fact that there were still very few people out and I was hoping to get to see some roosting terns – still in the hope that one with a color ring shows up that I can actually read. I did not get to see any color rings, however, I got to see several red-throated divers (rødstrubet lom) fishing very close to the shore which made it all worth it nonetheless.

In the afternoon we hosted a family nature club tour at the birders’ club. Several families with children came to play educational games with birds. Unfortunately it was far too windy to open nets to catch birds but Simon climbed up to the roof to get the house martin (bysvale) chicks out of the nest we knew there. They were still too small to be ringed, however, so the families went to look at butterflies instead before they had a bird quiz and a little snack to end the afternoon.

Later we welcomed the new guests that will stay in the apartment this week: Rasmus, Pil, Sally og Falke. Tomorrow the weather will still be bad but from Tuesday on we can hopefully go ringing again as usual and the guests will be able to see more of the work we do.

Ringmærkning (Kabeltromlen)

Common Snipe – Dobbeltbekkasin – 1

Blackbird –  Solsort – 1

Reed Warbler – Rørsanger – 2

Lesser Whitethroat – Gærdesanger – 1

Lesser Redpoll – Gråsisken, Lille (cabaret) – 1

Common Whitethroat – Tornsanger –  2

Total: 8

People : Martina Hillbrand,  Simon S. Christiansen, Amandine Doré

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

Today we did not go ringing at Kabeltromlen in the morning as the weather was rainy and windy. However, Martina went at Grenen tip to count the Sandwich terns and they were many ! She counted around 80 roosting terns, which is much more than what we had counted the previous days.

During the day, we took advantage of this bad weather to complete some ”office” tasks and then decided to go ringing at Kabeltromlen in the evening, since the weather forecats seemed to be more friendly.

We opened the nets around 17:00, and Mette and Asta joined us an hour later for the first net checks. We caught several Lesser Redpolls (Lille Gråsisken), as well as a couple of Bullfinches (Dompap Lille), a male and a female. We also got a very nice beautiful Reed Bunting (Rørspurv).

And the highlight of the evening, especially for Martina, was the catch of a flock of juvenile blue tits (Blåmejse), her favorite bird ! We caught 3 young ones, as well as 1 adult.

Mette and Asta left later on to join an exciting ”Nightjar Guided Tour” in Sandmilen.

In the evening, the sky eventually cleared up and we enjoyed some minutes of sunlight and blue sky.

We kept ringing until 22:00 and then decided to go back home since we will probably go tomorrow morning as well, depending on the weather.

Ringmærkning (Kabeltromlen)

Lesser Whitethroat - Gærdesanger – 1

Lesser Redpoll - Gråsisken Lille – 3

Reed Warbler - Rørsanger – 2

Bullfinch – Dompap lille – 2

Blue tit – Blåmejse – 3

Chiffchaff – Gransanger – 2

Total: 13

People : Martina Hillbrand,  Simon S. Christiansen, Amandine Doré

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

Når man kan lide at kigge på fugle, så ved man, at det kræver en stor portion tålmodighed og en del held. Ofte ser man det, man kommer efter - og næsten lige så ofte er fuglen fløjet, eller den har gemt sig, når man kommer.

Som amatørfugleelskere er vi på aktiv ferie på Skagen Fuglestation. Vi får lov til at være med i felten og på sidelinjen når der tælles og mærkes fugle. Det er en virkelig dejlig og lærerig måde at holde ferie på. I dag var ingen undtagelse…

Vi tog til Jennes Sø for at se fuglene blive ringmærkede. Vi skulle både kigge på fuglene og lave optagelser til en video til Skagen Fuglestations instagram/Facebook (tjek den ud!). Efter at have kigget nærmere på en solsort, en gransanger og en tornsanger gik vi videre med Amandine til skarvkolonien. Hun skulle tælle ungerne i rederne. Og så så vi den… Sølvhejren! Når man aldrig har set sådan en før, så føler man virkelig, at man har fået jackpot i fuglelotteriet. Virkelig smuk var den, som den stod der og lyste hvidt i baggrunden af den næsten dystopisk mørke skarvkoloni, og det blev ikke mindre kontrastfuldt af de truende, mørke skyer over os. Virkelig en god oplevelse.

Til sidst tog vi til Nordstranden for at finde stor præstekrave. Vi ville også gerne have fundet nogle reder, men vi så kun nogle enkelte fugle pile afsted i vandkanten og søge føde. Men som sagt, når du leder efter fugle så har du brug for held - og selvfølgelig viden om, hvor og hvordan de lever. Da vi forlod Nordstranden kom Amandine og Martina (aka de professionelle frivillige) og de fandt selvfølgelig stor præstekrave og reder med æg. 

Hvis nogen for nyligt har set rovdyr (f.eks. ræv) ved kolonien hører vi gerne om det! Så vi kan komme nærmere et svar på hvad som har taget ungerne. Hold oså gerne øje hvis du ligger vejen forbi den næste tid og lad os vide hvis der sker noget.

Vinden har godt fat i Skagen for tiden og man kan godt blive sulten af al den blæst, så vi besluttede at ende dagens fugleeventyr her, og tage ned til byen og få en god frokost.

Ringmærkning (Jennes Sø):

Gransanger – Chiffchaff - 2

Topmejse – Crested Tit – 1

Rødhals – Robin - 1

Tornsanger – Common Whitethroat – 1

Total: 5

Folk: Martina Hillbrand, Simon S. Christiansen, and Amandine Doré

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området

Yesterday evening, we went ringing at Kabeltromlen, hoping to catch waders thanks to the new nets we set up in the reeds. Winds were still quite strong, but we surprisingly caught some birds, more than we expected. Almost all of them were recaptures, only two of them were new birds. And unfortunately, no wader were caught, even though we flushed a Common Snipe (Dobbeltbekkasin) several times. 

During the ringing, I went down to Grenen beach, close to the tip, to check the Sandwich Terns (Splitterne) and count them. None of them were roosting, they were actively fishing and therefore I could not count them. However, I enjoyed very much seeing them diving in the water and catching some fish. It’s always very impressive !

Sunset at Grenen tip

Moreover, the seals were at the Grenen tip, hadn’t seen them since I arrived, and I had been looking forward to see them. They were amazing !

Seals 

We closed the nets around 22:00 and went back home, to get some sleep before the morning ringing.

Martina went opening the wader nets at 2:30am, as it is more likely to catch them during the dark hours of the night. I joined at 3:15am to open the rest of the nets, and we carried on our normal ringing. Again, we got another Blackcap (Munk)  “wave” and we really wonder where they all come from. We thought that by now we had probably ringed all the Blackcaps of Skagen, if not Denmark !
And today was also a very special “Munk day”, because we caught our first juvenile Blackcap ! Finally !

Juvenile Blackcap (munk)

The winds were not slowing down in the morning, even getting stronger and we decided to close the nets early, at 6:45am. In the last net checks, we caught two beautiful Bullfinches (Dompap Lille), one male and one female.  

Male Bullfinch (Dompap Lille)

We went back home and got some sleep after this long night/morning, before pursuing our daily office tasks. We then later went to set up nets for the CES ringing that we will do tomorrow.

Ringmærkning (Kabeltromlen) - 01/07/2020:

Common Whitethroat - Tornsanger - 1

Chiffchaff - Gransanger - 1

Total: 2

Ringmærkning (Kabeltromlen) - 02/07/2020:

Great tit - Musvit - 1

Marsh Warbler - Kærsanger - 1

Lesser Whitethroat - Gærdesanger  - 2

Garden Warbler - Havesanger - 2

Blackcap - Munk - 7

Common Whitethroat - Tornsanger - 2

Chiffchaff - Gransanger - 3

Total: 20

People : Martina Hillbrand,  Simon S. Christiansen, Amandine Doré

Klik her for at se dagens observationer indtastet i Dofbasen af observatører i området