Water rail and goodbyes

Water rail
This morning was very foggy when Rosemary and I went to open the nets at Kabletromeln. Lille Simon joined us, bouncing and ready to go after a full three hours of sleep, for the first round. The day was not too busy with birds in the nets, but a slow trickle came by for us and we got to compare closely the Kærsanger and Rørsanger next to each other. On the second to last round, Rosemary and I walked the nets in opposite directions, and where we met in the middle we saw two water rails (Vandrikse) fly into the net. They are a bit big to get caught in the mesh, and one bounced out straight away but we ran for the second one and managed to hold it inside the pocket. Markus and Louise also came over from World’s End III to see the Vandrikse.

Throughout the day we got to hear about the details of the Snipe mission last night. Cora was missing from ringing and count today because she was unfortunately bitten by a cat that she was trying to rescue in a great act of heroism. She went instead to the hospital with Simon where the doctor told her that no medical intervention is necessary. Most importantly, they saw two Ospreys from the car on the way home. The status of the cat remains unknown.
Markus and Louise went observing at World’s End III, where they saw two Sparrowhawks (Spurvehøg), one young Kestrel (Tårnfalk), and some Alk.
We had a lovely group dinner together in town today, where Boss Simon entertained everyone with his stories about prank calling other bird observatories over the phone, which I enjoyed hearing about very much.
I have some parting words to report from our (very sadly) leaving volunteers.
Markus: “Ciao for now.”
Louise: “I’m not that funny.”
Rosemary: “Uhhh… Eat my jorts.”
It has been a glorious summer season and I am very sad to say goodbye to such amazing coworkers. I am sure they will do great things and we will see each other again in the future, especially my soul mate Rosemary, who I am soul-bound to.

Ringing totals:

Total: 14

Today’s observations in Dofbasen from observers in the area.