7 Pallid Harriers & a Firecrest

As the sunrise creeps ever earlier, Yehonatan and I had the nets at Kabeltromlen open at 5:20am and were shortly joined by Simon and our guests, Jakob and Birgit. We were started catching as usual, with plenty of Chiffchaffs (Gransanger) and two Redwing (Vindrossel), when suddenly our morning got a whole lot better when I extracted a Firecrest (Rødtoppet Fuglekonge) from an otherwise empty net! Only a few Firecrests are caught at Skagen each year and, as this was a new species in the hand for both myself, and Yehonatan, it really made our morning.

Firecrest (Rødtoppet Fuglekonge) at Kabeltromlen. Photo: Yehonatan.

We decided to close the nets a little earlier than normal to make the most of the calm weather and the fact that a Rough-legged Buzzard (Fjeldvåge) had been spotted resting near Nordstrand. Yehonatan and I quickly set up the raptor net near Nedermose with the stuffed Eagle Owl (Stor Hornugle) to attract the attention of passing raptors. We quickly saw the Rough-legged Buzzard hunting and it seemed interested in the owl but, just skimmed over the net by a few metres! Hopefully tomorrow we’ll have more luck…

Dante and Michael headed to Verdens Endes for morning observations and had an excellent morning for migrating raptors. Their highlights were two adult males, and one adult female Pallid Harriers (Steppehøg), four Black Kites, one of the Greater Spotted Eagles (Stor Skrigeørn) and a juvenile Glaucous Gull (Gråmåge). Elsewhere, Alex Sand Frich found a calling Penduline Tit at Skarvsøen, and a total of 7 Pallid Harriers (Steppehøg), both adult males and females, were seen by multiple observers throughout the day in Skagen. Michael joined Simon on a very successful 'Raptor Tour' in the afternoon and managed to see a White Stork (Hvid Stork) as well as plenty of raptors.

A full list of today's observations can be found here.

Today's raptor summary can be found here.

People: Yehonatan Ben aroia, Michael Colley, Dante Shepherd, Jeppe Madsen, Lauren Evans, Simon S. Christiansen, Jakob & Birgit.

Ringing (Kabeltromlen):

Gransanger (Chiffchaff)- 9

Fuglekonge (Goldcrest)- 5

Rødtoppet Fuglekonge (Firecrest)- 1

Rødhals (Robin)- 7

Gærdesmutte (Wren)- 3

Jernspurv (Dunnock)- 1

Rørspurv (Reed Bunting)- 1

Vindrossel (Redwing)- 2

Sangdrossel (Song Thrush)- 2

Solsort (Blackbird)- 1

Total: 32