Cutting Net Lanes

Greetings!

Unfortunately, there is not much to report on the bird front today. While the past few days have been quite productive for ringing and seawatching (our two main fieldwork projects for the autumn), today was an exception. Overnight and throughout the day it's been quite cloudy, and for southbound migratory birds coming from Norway, Sweden, and perhaps elsewhere, making the flight across the Kattegat or Skagerrak in a dense grey fog with no visibility is far from preferable. Hence, few migrants arrived here in Skagen; Rita and Nathan reported a very inactive seawatch at World's End 3, and Martina, Alice, and I had a similarly slow day of ringing with 17 birds, the highlights being 2 Icterine Warblers (Gulbug) and 1 Reed Bunting (Rørspurv). However, days like today are fascinating displays of the relevance of weather conditions to bird migration, and truly, a day can never even be considered mediocre when there's birds involved!

After their seawatch, Rita and Nathan went into town (while Martina, Alice, and I rested) to do some grocery shopping and search for the continuing Little Auk "Søkonge" in the Skagen harbor. This bird was found a few days ago by local birders, and is quite a rarity for the summer! Little Auks breed in large colonies on islands in the North Atlantic within the arctic circle, including Greenland, Svalbard, Jan Mayen, Franz Joseph Land, and Novaya Zemyla among others (though there are some small colonies known in the extreme North Pacific in the Bering Strait). They regularly spend their winters in the waters surrounding Skagen, so in general they're not a rarity, but it's the time of year that makes this individual interesting, Perhaps this bird migrated prematurely, or got lost while on a foraging foray, but what's for certain is that this bird is behaving strange. After a short search, Rita and Nathan found the auk, and were surprised to find it approach within a few meters of them, allowing wonderful views and photo opportunities.

Little Auk (Søkonge).  Photo by Nathan

Later in the afternoon, Knud Pedersen drove Martina, Nathan, and I to Nordstrand so we could walk to the nearby Cormorant "Skarv" Lake to finish clearing lanes for mist nets at at a new CES ringing site. CES, which stands for "Constant Effort Sites," is a standardized bird ringing program which seeks to regularly ring birds at the same site every year through the breeding season. The data collected from CES ringing is incredibly valuable for estimating the survivorship and reproductive output of local bird populations, and documenting changes in those variables over time. After several hours of hard work, mosquito bites, and water logged boots, we finished cutting all of the net lanes, and are excited to begin ringing at this site next year!

Cheers!
Max

Ringing Totals:

Common Chiffchaff / Gransanger : 2

Great Tit / Musvit : 2

Common Whitethroat / Tornsanger : 5

Reed Bunting / Rørspurv : 1

Eurasian Blackcap / Munk : 2

Lesser Whitethroat / Gaerdesanger : 1

Reed Warbler / Rørsanger : 1

Icterine Warbler / Gulbug : 2

Marsh Warbler / Kaersanger : 1

Total : 17

 Local observations of the day in DOFBasen