Busy day full of birds

Unusual schedule today since it was raining this morning. We still woke up at 6 to check for the weather and decide how the day would go. The weather forecast was predicting rain until 8:00 and 30 min from 09:30.

We decided not to go ringing right away in the morning so we don’t have to close the nets during our session. We therefore went birdwatching  instead until the rain stops.
We went to Buttervej and Højen Fyr to check for some migrants and we were quite happy to find a lot of birds there ! According to Simon, there never has been so many birds in that area ! Goldcrests (Fuglekonge)were calling from every bushes, Chaffinches (Bogfinke) and Greenfinches (Grønsisken) were feeding, flying over us, and a hell lot of Wrens (Gærdesmutte) “wrening” around. Simon found a odd looking brown warbler which turned out to be a classical Chiffchaff (Gransanger). It made his heart beating faster though, him being eager to find a Radde’s Warbler (Schwarzsanger). The rarest bird to be found this morning was a Lesser Spotted Woodpecker (Lille Flagspætte). Unfortunately, I was the only to see it and I couldn’t share it with Amelie and Simon. This species is really rare here in Skagen, not even yearly, with previous records being from 2020, 2018 and 2016. On our way back, we made a quick stop at Grenen Stald to look for the Turtle Dove (Turtledue) but it didn’t show up. Amelie still enjoyed that stop and made herself a new friend.

When the rain stopped at 10, Amelie and I went opening the nets, quickly joined by Kirsten, Oluf and then Simon. Even though it was already late in the morning, birds were really active and each of our rounds were super busy ! The most numerous species was the Goldcrest (Fuglekonge).
Kirsten was really happy about her session since she felt more confortable in handling and exctracting birds, nicely helped by the team.
Simon left us earlier since he had a meeting to attend with Kristina, which was dealing about a project involving yound children.
Today again, we caught another Norwegian recapture, this time a young male Blackcap (Munk).

Amelie and Simon went again to Batteriskoven to catch the 2 long staying Pink-footed Geese (Kortnæbbet Gås), and they managed to get really close to them this time, at less than 5 meters from them ! But 5 meters is not close enough and the Geese escaped. This story will go on tomorrow again and maybe our motivated catchers will find a good trick to catch them !

Esben is joining us tonight, and will go nightcatching as he always does ! Which resulted in the 3rd Jack Snipe this season

Ringmærkning (Kabeltromlen):

Blåmejse - Blue Tit – 17

Bogfinke – Chaffinch – 3

Dompap – Bullfinch - 3

Fugelkonge – Goldcrest - 13

Gærdesmutte -Wren - 17

Gransanger - Chiffchaff – 24

Lille Gråsisken – Lesser Redpoll – 1

Jernspurv - Dunnock – 3

Munk - Blackcap – 27

Musvit – Great Tit - 9

Rødhals - Robin – 35

Rødstjert – Redstart - 1

Rørspurv - Reed Bunting - 8

Sangdrossel - Song Thrush – 1

Solsort – Blackbird - 1

Sortmejse - Coal Tit – 3

Stor Flagspætte – Great Spotted Woodpecker – 2

Træløber, Nordlig – Treecreeper - 1

Total: 169

Ringmærkning (Night catching at Grenen):

Enkeltbekkasin – Jack Snipe - 1

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

People: Martin Grienenberger, Amelie Zeller, Christina Stinn, Simon S. Christiansen, Oluf Lou, Kirsten, Kristina Sonderkjaer