Today, Leona and I started our morning around 3:15 in the morning as we started to prepare for our morning observations in Verdensende 1. Though it was early, the pleasant bicycle ride to the location was more than enough to wake us up and prepare us for hours of meticulous observation, but if we did need to be awoken further a cloud of mosquitoes awaited us on the shrub-bordered paths to the observation site. Once we successfully fought our way to the observation site we were greeted with rays of sunshine, and many Common Scoters (Sortand). But the scene that most impressed us was the aggressive pursuit of two skuas (Kjover) after a single determined Arctic tern clutching at its fishy meal.

Upon returning to the lighthouse, Hanelie soon greeted us with a tasty proposition we had heard much about, apple pancakes. Within an hour, all the rooms were filled with the smell of cinnamon, dough, and baked apples, and as expected the pancakes tasted as delicious as they smelled. After our morning meal, Hanelie, Alice, Megan, Leona, and I discussed how we would divide the group to tend to the mist nets in grave need of repair at various sites and in the attic. By the end of the afternoon, team Alice, Megan, and Leona successfully patched up all the nets on the north side all the while enjoying the wonderful weather and the avoiding the hungry mosquitoes, while team Hanelie and Rita struggled with the nets from the attic but remained confident it will be in working order by tomorrow.

Alice Scalzo Mist Net Repair. Photo Credit: Megan Nepshinsky

Rita DeLucco Mist Net Repair. Photo Credit:Hanelie Sidhu

The end of the day came to a natural end as we approached closer to dinner which would turn out to be a Danish surprise. Much to our surprise, the friendly next-door guests had prepared a traditional Danish home-cooked meal which they kindly and creatively turned vegetarian in order to suit our dietary preferences. The meal in question “tarteletter” stuffed with bechamel sauce and butter beans and topped ever so elegantly with mushrooms and asparagus graced a platter in several rows. By the end of the meal we were positively stuffed and were informed that “tarteletter” in Danish means “take it easy”, which we did after three or more servings of the local delicacy. As we all prepared to say our goodbyes and goodnights, our guests shared yet another surprise, a life-like painting of a feather from Nightjar (Natravne). A bird I hope to encounter in the near future for the very first time.

Tarteletter Dinner by guests Jesper & Anne. Photo Credit: Megan Nepshinsky

Water Color Painting of Nightjar Feather by guest Jesper. Photo Credit: Leona Gottschalkson

Observations of the day in DOFbasn from observers in the area

Sum of the Raptors in the area based on observations typed into Dofbasen the same day

People at the station:  Hanelie Sidhu, Alice Scalzo, Leona Gotctshalkson, Rita DeLucco, Megan Nepshinsky, our guests Jesper and Anne 

Hi everyone!

This morning Rita, Alice, Megan and I went out with Skopes and Camera along the beach to Worlds End 3. On the way there we saw a few Sandwich Terns „Splitterne“ very close to the beach, which we were not happy about because they are probably sick with the bird flu, which currently affects quite a few seabirds, especially Gannets „Sule“and Terns „Terne“. At present we receive many messages of dead Gannets and a very sad zello call reached us in the afternoon: Claus Madsen had found 53 dead Gannets "Sule" between Gammle Skagen and Kanderstederne.
Back to our morning count: we counted the resting Gulls and Terns. There was also a Little Tern "Dværgterne" and we saw three light morph Arctic Skuas „Almindelig Kjove“ chasing Terns „Terne“. We also tried to read Colerrings, we saw two Color-ringed Gulls and one Ringed Sandwich Tern.

Northern Gannet "Sule"

But unfortunately we did not manage to get close enough to read the rings. We made our way back to the station, there we used the time to take care of the Picture Archive and the Raptor summary, to update guidelines, to eat or to rest a bit. Also, Ritas suitcase arrived while she was sleeping and when she came out of her room from her nap, she was happily surprised to be finally reunited with her luggage that had been lost yesterday at the airport in Amsterdam. Jesper and Anne met friends today and went to the museum together. In the afternoon they went shopping with Leona, Rita and Megan. On this occasion they could also pick up the bike we had in the workshop. Alice and I meanwhile drove to Kabeltromle where we took care of the nets. Back at the station Megan had cooked us well, once again, we ate and then Knud came by, bringing us a dead Great Skua „Storkjove“as well as a dead Eagle Owl „Stor Hornugle“ for the freezer. This was a sad event, the owl was very fresh and in good condition and Knud's guess is that it was predated by White-tailed Eagles „Havørn”. We would rather have seen it alive than marvel at the great plumage on the lifeless owl body.

Simon & Lisa has gone on vacation but they still tried to go out with Trammelnets futher south in Vendsyssel to try and see if they could catch Quails (Vagtel) in the night. One came close but none got ringed, but they found quite a few. 5 singing males and 1 individual calling.

Tonight there was another event in Skagen: The Barn Fire on the beach, for us not Skandinaven quite impressed and we also saw the Danish Princess Marie, who visited Skagen and gave a speech. After that we came back to the station and we early birds quickly crawled into bed, respectively I plan to do so soon when this blog is finished.

Good night, see you tomorrow! 

Hanelie went to Batteriskoven this morning, she found a young blackbird that she really liked and Alice wanted to go out with the stations camera but the SD Card had magically disappeared. So she stayed in and worked a bit on her applications.

Gladly it turned out Simon had taken the SD Card so she didn't have to worry anymore that she lost it somewhere.

We then went out to the cormorant lake so that Simon could show us the new place for the CES ringing and to show us where we will prepare the reeds for nets. While walking there we saw a group of 4 Bearded Reedlings(Skægmejse) and a Bittern(Rørdrum) flying over. Another lifer for me were the Bearded Reedlings which I still wanted to see before leaving as I am leaving already in 4 days, so that was really nice.

Checking out new places for nets, Photo by Alice Scalzo

Afterwards we worked a bit on the raptor project and then went back to the station to eat something. Alice then went to the station garden to put up the last net and to take the owl net down. Hanelie also went out in the field again and looked at some plants.

Galium pallustre, Photo by Hanelie Sidhu

In the meantime Meghan had worked on the welcome package for new volunteers and finished it so everything was ready for Rita. She arrived today and will be part of our team until the end of July. Megan was a big help for Rita today because she helped to coordinate everything as unfortunately her luggage was lost on the way and also by just being in touch with her from the beginning. Now apparently the luggage is in Aalborg, so let’s hope that it will arrive in the next few days.

Our guests joined us in the field today and afterwards Hanne went on a walk at the beach and looked at the Eiders, while Jesper had a nap. After that they made another walk through the dunes together.

Observations of the day in DOFbasn from observers in the area

Sum of the Raptors in the area based on observations typed into Dofbasen the same day

People at the station: Simon S. Christiansen, Hanelie Sidhu, Alice Scalzo, Leona Gottschalkson, Megan Nepshinsky, Rita DeLucco, our guests Jesper and Hanne

Today was a very exciting day with bird ringing! Hanelie and I opened the nets this morning, which included the three new nets that we put up the last couple of days. We had some of our usual birds, such as Marsh warblers (Kaersanger), Reed warblers (Rørsanger), Blackcap warblers (Munk) and Lesser whitethroats (Gaerdesanger). However, it was on the last round that we caught a female Bluethroat (Blåhals) in one of the new nets! It was a nice treat to see this bird at the end of our morning ringing! 

Pictures of the Bluethroat (Blåhals) caught during our ringing session - Photo credit: Hanelie Sidhu

Afterwards, we rested for the exciting night of European nightjar (Natravn) ringing ahead and prepared dinner for a total of 10 people from both the volunteer group and those in association with the lighthouse! Hanelie made her famous The Blyth recipe, Leona made The Redwing dessert, and we had a salad as well. Please see below for the recipes if you’d like to make them for yourself!

 Meanwhile, Lisa and Simon sought to catch a magpie (husskade) in their garden! Low and behold they caught a beautiful individual in their net. Notice the long rectrices and iridescent feathers on this bird :) 

Pictures of the magpie (husskade) caught in Simon and Lisa’s garden - Photo credit: Lisa Vergin

Once we reached the 21:00 hour, we prepared to head towards Sandmilen for our nightjar (Natrvn) ringing. We set up four nets and also put out sound recordings to attract the birds. 

Picture of setting up the net for nightjar ringing - Photo credit: Simon S. Christiansen

 At the midnight hour, we were super fortunate to catch our first nightjar! This bird was a recapture (ring number: M8440) originally ringed on the 9th of July in 2021 as a 3+ female. Simon noticed that the bird last year was about to lay a clutch of eggs last year too. It was cool to have a recapture from the summer before! Around the 2am mark, we also captured a new nightjar male in the nets. It was really cool to see the different wing band sizes to be able to differentiate between males and females! 

Pictures from ringing the male nightjar -  Photo credit: Simon S. Christiansen 

 We took the nets down around 3am, when the sky was beginning to lighten again. It was a really cool treat to see some amazing birds throughout the day!

 Thank you for your support and for keeping up with our blog! Please be encouraged to visit us at the Skagen Fuglestation and check out our nearly updated birder’s club!

 Have a wonderful day and enjoy the longest day of the year!

With aloha,

Megan 

Birds ringed today at KAB:

Gransanger: 3

Blåhals: 1

Gulbug: 1

Gærdesanger: 3

Kærsanger: 7

Rørsanger: 10

Tornsanger: 1

Bogfinke: 3

Munk: 5

Solsort: 1

Total: 34 birds

 Additional birds: 

Husskade: 1

Natrvn: 1

Observations of the day in DOFbasn from observers in the area

Raptor summary of the raptors entered on DOFbasen today

People at the station: Simon S. Christiansen, Lisa Vergin, Olaf   Hanelie Sidhu, Alice Scalzo, Leona Gottschalkson, Megan Nepshinsky, our guests Jesper and Hanne and Lars Pedersen and Olaf Lou

Click here for the following recipes:

The Blyth recipe

The Redwing dessert recipe

Today Alice went out in the morning to go on a walk to Grenen taking some pictures at the beach. She managed to take some really nice pictures of terns fishing in the sea.

 A Sandwich Tern with a fish in it's beak

Afterwards Alice and I went out in the lighthouse garden to put up some nets and cut the gras. There were sooo many mosquitos! There were even more than at Kabletromlen! So we had a fierce fight with them. Our jeans were hard to bite through and after equipping ourselves with mosquito hats and repellant they weren't able to conquer us, still they were quite persistent.

Simon came back to the station to check ringing sheets with us and discuss some plans for the coming days.

Megan worked in birders club, she is nearly done with the welcome package for volunteers and the scavanger hunt for the birders club. While she was doing that people came in and she had some nice chats with other bird enthusiasts.

Hanelie was preparing the nightjar bag for our excursion to Sandmilen tomorrow, we are already really excited for the nightjar catching! She then took care of the picture archive, updated the freezer list and then checked the ringing sheets together with Simon.

While she was doing that I did some groceries in the city to get the last ingredients for the Dinner we will have tomorrow with the people from the exhibition. After dinner I already created a nice dessert for tomorrow and Alice helped me with that.

The dessert for tomorrow

Also today our two new Guests arrived in the late afternoon. Before coming here they saw a Red kite in the area of Skagen.

Have a nice Evening,

Leona

Observations of the day in DOFbasn from observers in the area

Raptor summary of the raptors entered on DOFbasen today

People at the station: Simon S. Christiansen, Hanelie Sidhu, Alice Scalzo, Leona Gottschalkson, Megan Nepshinsky, our guests Jesper and Hanne

Hello friends!

Today was a very special day, almost one that you would say one in which we were presented with a golden opportunity :) Leona, Hanelie, Alice and I woke up very early to catch the 5:20am train down to Skørping. From there, the wonderful Hans Christophersen picked us up from the station and we were on our way!

With hardly a cloud in the sky, we had an excellent day of spotting birds and wildlife. We were in the car for only about 10 minutes before we spotted a little owl (Kirkeuglen) sitting on the roof of a local farm. There was a second one in the window too. Hans said that this one of only a few pairs found in this part of Denmark. We felt very lucky to have seen them!

Picture of a little owl (Kirkeuglen)

After this, we continued our journey to Lille Vildmose area (link to their website here), we saw many birds and other wildlife throughout our time there. During one of our first stops, we saw a Great Spotted Woodpecker (Store flagspætte), as well as Red-backed shrikes (Rødrygget tornskade), tree pipits (Skovpiber), whinchats (Bynkefugl) and stonechats (Sortstrubet bynkefugl), just to name a few. We also heard grasshopper warblers (Græshoppesanger), although we did not have the fortune to see them. They like to hide in the reeds, making it difficult to spot them! 

Picture of a Red-backed shrike - Photo credit: Leona Gottschalkson

In addition to these birds, we saw plenty of wild boars (Vildsvinet) with their young, red deer (Kronhjorten) and reintroduced bison (Bisoner). It was so great driving along with Hans and seeing all the various wildlife as we made our way throughout the reserve!

Picture of red deer, bison and wild boars - Photo credit: Leona Gottschalkson 

At around 11am, we had a very special opportunity in the reserve! We met up with Anton Larsen and Jan Tøttrup Nielsen to see if we could ring a Golden Eagle (Kongeørnen) chick that had hatched roughly 5-6 weeks ago. We headed into the forest towards the nest and waited in anticipation as Jan expertly climbed the tree to check the nest. Luckily, there was the chick in the nest, with remains of a red deer that a parent had left for it! After gingerly lowering the chick to ground level, Jan was able to ring it using both silver and color rings. The color ring is green and red to indicate that the bird is a hatch year of 2022. 

 Pictures of the Golden Eagle chick - Photo credit: Leona Gottschalkson

Jan is also interested in studying diets of both white-tailed eagles (Havørnen) and golden eagles (Kongeørnen). After he returned the chick to its nest, he located remains of feathers and fur both in and around the nest. Jan has thus far notated at least 88 different prey species of golden eagles, whereas he has noted at least 52 different prey species of white tailed eagles! We were so amazed to see the Golden Eagle (Kongeørnen) up close in person and we are excited to touch base with Hans to find out when the bird eventually leaves the nest!

After seeing the Golden Eagle, we continued around the reserve, spotting more and more species! We checked out a white-tailed eagle's nest and saw that both parents were flying in the area. After this, we climbed an observation tower to continue birding while enjoying a great lunch that Hans's wife helped to prepare. Lastly, we traveled around Birkesø lake, where we saw a lot of wading birds, such as Eurasian Spoonbills (Skestorken), as well as the Black-headed gull (Hættemågen) colony! We spotted Lapwings (Vibe) as well flying about. 

Photo of a Lapwing (Vibe) - Photo credit: Leona Gottschalkson

All in all, it was a fantastic day and we were so very fortunate to have Hans guiding us throughout Lille Vildmose. We were also super lucky to see Jan and Anton ring the Golden Eagle! Tomorrow, we are excited to go ringing with Olaf and to see what birds we will have at KAB. :)

As we finish out today's blog, we wanted to say hank you for reading and for all your support for Skagen Fuglestation! We are all wishing you a great rest of the week and a fabulous weekend ahead! Stay tuned for more happenings tomorrow :) 

With aloha,

Megan 

 People: Simon S. Christiansen, Lisa Vergin, Hanelie Sidhu, Alice Scalzo, Leona Grottschallesoh, Megan Nepshinsky, our guests Trine and Aija.

Hi everyone!

Let's start with a new report from a full day in Skagen (and surroundings)! 

Alice and Megan took the Morning Obs at World's End 1 today. There wasn't much going on but a few more species than the last few mornings. They saw a larger group of Velvet Scoters "Fløjlsand" and also Red-breasted Mergensers "Toppet Skallesluger" migrating. Could this mean that the first birds are already coming out of the breeding grounds and we will see more soon? We are looking forward to that of course, more training for our clicker muscles ;-)

Leona slept longer, me too, and then left for breakfast with my mother. Funnily enough, she has rented a holiday home from Poul Jenne and so I finally had the opportunity to ask if I could try out his cool self-built ropeway at his cottage at Jennes Sø. This was actually planned for later in the morning, but then we moved up our butterfly excursion a bit with Jørgen and Jennes Sø had to wait. So we left at 10 am with Jørgen to check out some good butterfly areas south of Skagen and it was a very successful excursion as we saw many and very nice species!

 Northern Brown Argus "Sortbrun blåfugl"

Purple-edged Copper "Violetrandet ildfugl"

Common Blue "Almindelig Blåfugl"

Black-veined White "Sortåret hvidvinge"

Many thanks to Jørgen for the great excursion, there is much more to see outside than cool birds!

While we were butterfly-watching Karin finally came to the station to bake us the promised super delicious rabarber cake. Thank you!

When we came back, not only the cake was waiting, but also our appointment with Poul Jenne, so Karin and I set off for Jennes Sø again while Leona and Megan did some shopping and Alice had a rest. At Paul's cottage we immediately tried out the cable car, Karin rode once and I climbed up the tree house four times, marveling at the building skills of Paul, his son and grandson and enjoying the ride down.

Then Poul invited us for drinks and we sat at Jennes Sø for a while and heard stories about a frozen Jennes Sø and looked at the pictures and marveled at how quickly the landscape changes here, you can already see that in pictures from not-so-long ago. Finally, we had to go back. We heard from Trine and Aija, that they visited the Teddybear Museum today.

Megan cooked a very good dinner and tomorrow we have to catch an early train for our trip with Hans Christophersen to Lille Vildmose. We are looking forward to it, see you then!

Hanelie

Today’s observations in Dofbasen from observers in the area

Klik her for at se opsummeret observationer af rovfugle i Skagen

People at the station: Jørgen Kabel, Poul Jenne, Hanelie Sidhu, Alice Skalzo, Leona Gottschalkson, Megan Nephinsky, Karin, our gusts Trine and Aija