When opening the nets in the darkness I already heard a Nightingale (Nattergal). First time this year. And I was lucky it was hanging in the net when I made my first round. And it was also the first one for this season. And to my surprise there was another new one for the season a spotted Flycatcher (Grå Fluesnapper). It looks like that they are now finding the way to garden, In total 55 birds (46 new ones and 9 recaptures) and some variation in species, 15 different ones.

Some birds are going to the hair dresser before they are flying in the net (see picture of Lesser Whitethroat (Gærdesanger). It is not a disease but a site effect of the stuff they eat. Something in the flowers is glueing the feathers together and does not harm the birds, I think.

The Nightingale had a tick and after taking the picture I removed the tick.

And last but not least a close up of the Spotted Flycatcher

With kind regards and till tomorrow

Robert

We opened all nets (Clausjanic and me) and were ready opening at 4.45. The wind was still strong (10 m/s) and it had rained in the night. Numbers of birds in the garden are still relatively low for the time of the year. But we had our first Whitthroat (Tornsanger), so there is some progress. In total we caught 44 birds (37 new and 7 recaptures).

We caught a relative large willow warbler (wing length 72 mm) and th bird appeared to be lees green as normal Willow Warblers (løvsanger). Also the underside of the bird and the throat were not as yellow as the normal one. It could have been the Nordic Willow Warbler a different subspecies as the normal one. I have added a picture, not a good one. The bird refused to calm down and then it is difficult to make a good picture. And in addition I do not like to make pictures under those circumstances too.

In the last edition of the Dutch Birding you can find an article about the difficulties between recognising the different (sub)species of the Chiffchaff (Gransanger). There was a research project on this complex of (sub)species: collybita, abietinus and tristis. The result of the project (DNA analysis) was that Dutch ringers are able to recognise in most cases tristis but were in most cases not able to pinpoint abietinus. They say in the article that it is impossible to differentiate between those two subspecies based on plumage and on size.

Maybe to differentiate between de Nordic Willow warbler and the normal Willow Warbles is also not really possible. There is a huge overlap in size and the plumage is also vary variable.

The weather in the afternoon was pretty nice so I decided to eat outside. But I had to go inside again because there were too many, I believe in English, picnic beetles (could not find the Danish name), but maybe somebody can help me. See picture.

Tomorrow on my own again and I am possitive for the day to come, maybe Hans has to help me.

Ciao Robert

Dagen startede som sædvanlig med netopsætning - denne gang med 'mødetid' kl. 04.15. Det er tidligt, men det bliver kun værre og værre de næste uger.

Nattens vejr havde ikke helt været med os, og det blæste stadig godt fra morgenstunden, men trods alt ikke mere end at alle net kunne sættes. Første runde var vel egentlig OK med 12 fugle, men det var så også det! Resten af runderne slæbte sig afsted med 1-5 fugle, så det var ikke meget sved vi fik på panden i dag.
I alt 32 fugle gik i dag i nettene, hvoraf de 21 var nye mærkninger og 11 var genaflæsninger. Der gemmer sig dog hele 13 arter i tallene. Flere arter lader stadig vente på sig.
Den mest spændende fugl i dag kom på lukkerunden, hvor en rødhals med tysk ring fra Helgoland blev fanget. Det tager vist normalt lidt tid inden, der kommer svar tilbage fra Tyskland, men det gør det ikke mindre spændende at få data tilbage på den.

Stationen havde i dag besøg af Katja - en sød ung kvinde, som efter at have besøgt os på Åbent hus for et par uger siden, var blevet endnu mere interesseret
i fuglene og stationens arbejde mm. Det er altid skønt at få lov til at fortælle os vores fælles passion, og forhåbentlig får Katja lyst til at gøre endnu mere ud af interessen.
Da det var småt med fuglene lukkede vi nettene efter standardtid.

Efter en kort afslappende kop kaffe, hvorunder årets første hvepsevåge tog en æresrunde over stationen inden den igen fortsatte sit træk mod nord, gik turen mod Odden, hvor Louis, Gert m.fl. talte trækkende fugle. Det var som altid super hyggeligt, og bl.a. flere havørne, tinksmed, stor regnspove, en nysgerrig sæl mm. krydrede oplevelsen. Endnu en enkelt hvepsevåge kom også i land, og også den hastede mod nord.

Efter besøget på Odden var det for alvor blevet tid til en slapper inden enkelte gøremål skulle gøres færdigt. Robert indtastede dagens mærkninger i databasen, mens jeg påbegyndte mit projekt med at fylde huller på grusvejen til stationen. Hvis det er rigtigt, at godt begyndt er halvt færdigt, så er jeg vist halvvejs nu! Vi fik dog tid til at nyde Roberts nye Kowa-teleskop fra Naturbutikken med tilhørende telefon adapter. Nedenstående billede af stæren er taget med mobil gennem teleskopet. Imponerende! 

Anne-Marie skrev pludselig, at en rødrygget svale huserede over fårefolden, og alle mand strøg derud, men desværre uden at vi fandt den. Den var dog tilsyneladende over folden minimum indtil klokken 16.10. Det nærmer sig et kompleks. Jeg er altid kommet enten for sent eller er lige taget hjem, når der har været rødrygget svale på stationen, men heller ikke denne gang skulle blive lykkens gang for mit vedkommende.

Nina kokkerede endnu en gang et dejligt måltid for os - paprikagryde med ris - så nu er der faldet ro på os alle.

I morgen kunne godt blive spændende, da vinden går i syd, omend det lige nu tyder på en lille smule regn fra morgenstunden, og så skulle varmen komme forbi for en kort bemærkning.Det kunne give lidt spændende fugle - vi er som altid optimistiske.

Dagens mærkninger (aflæsninger i parentes)

Hvid vipstjert 1
Gærdesmutte 1 (1)
Jernspurv 1
Rødhals 7 (5)
Rødstjert 2
Sangdrossel 1
Gærdesanger (1)
Munk 3
Gransanger 1
Løvsanger 2
Fuglekonge (1)
Stillits 1
Tornirisk 1 (3)

This morning, when waking up, the weather was much better than the days before. Opened all the nets, but did not hear many birds when going around. But, nevertheless I came to the total of 47 birds (12 species). Amongst others a  beautifull male Linnet (Tornirisk), the first Garden Warbler (Havesanger) of the year and several Redstarts (Rødstjert). So happy guy again. Bo (Kayser) did a few rounds with me and he heard the Garden Warbler already singing and somewhat later it was hanging in one of the nets. Two of the pictures are made by him and the other one of the linnet by me.

Tomorrow looks promising again. Clausjanic will help me and I hope we will have a lot of work and of course Nina will be there too and will make our lives much more pleasant.

With kind regards

Robert 

The day started as predicted. Lot of wind and rain. So no nets open, only after 13.00 hours I opened a few nets and caught in total 8 birds: one new and 7 recaptures (see table). I checked all the nets whether they were opening easy to prevent surprises in the morning when I open the nets in the dark. I try not to use any light so early in the garden. Maybe a wrong idea, but I think you scare away the birds when doing so.

I got today just before writing this blog a mail that a chiffchaff ringed by me on the tenth of september last year here in Gedser Fuglestation was fround dead near Santander in Spain on the 24th of april this year. A pity that its live ended there. Maybe the bird was on its way back to Denmark.

I think I can open all nets tomorrow, weather forecast is much better than the last few days.

Let see what the new day will bring.

With kind regards  Robert

Not that I speak all of a sudden fluent Danish. This was the comment of the Danish Meteorological Institute (DMI) describing the weather of this day. Wind force 7 Beaufort or 14 to 15 m/s made me deciding not to open the nets today and it does not look good for the rest of the day either. Will be the first time for me being in Gedser that I will not be able to catch birds.

Yesterday I made a picture of some flowering trees in the garden. I think it really looks nice. And today one of the sea when a wind of 15 m/s (Bft 7) is blowing. I walked along the coast but was sometimes not so easy.

With kind regards

Robert

A not so warm day with a lot of wind, but wind from the south is not so bad in the garden. So I opende most of the nets. The rain was not a real problem overhere, some drops but not so much that I had to close the nets.Later in the afternoon I had hail and rain and the wind was increasing.

I  caught 29 birds (16 new and 13 recaptures). 

The highlight of the day for me was the Firecrest (Rødtoppet Fuglekonge). The first one in the hand this year. I five year ringing in Gjerrild no Firecrest till now, maybe in the near future. Just have to wait.

The forecast for tomorrow is even worst than it was for today. The wind was blowing 10 to 11 m/s and tomorrow this will be 15 meters per second. But rain isonly  expected in the afternoon, so will open a few nets and see what happens.

With kind regards

Robert

This morning was not really promising. Too much wind for nice catching and a chance of getting rain. I decided not to open too many nets. There were some birds in the nets when I made my first round. When ringing them little leaves were dropping from the trees (autumn?). No, it were petals from the flowers in the trees and when they were lying on the ground it looked just whether it had hailed (see picture). I closed around 11 o'clock with a total of 31 birds. More than half were recaptures of the days before. In total 10 species and the nicest one was a male Redstart (Rødstjert) and of this one I made a picture for you. Hope you like it too.

Tomorrow does not look promising at all. The weather forecast is really bad: a lot of wind and probably also some rain. Maybe I go to bed again after looking what the situation really will be. I do not think I have to phone Hans for asking him to help me.

Yesterday I placed two nets at the pond, but have not used them today and probably the first time will be at the end of the week. Let's hope that that will be the case.

With kind regards

Robert

Yesterday I arrived at the station in the afternoon. Henrick was still there. Nice to see the man behind some of the blogs in the last months. And was really surprised that Nina and Claus Jannick were there. Had not seen them for a long time. Corona makes live a bit difficult and prevents seeing some of the people you would like to meet more. Corona is also the reason that there are not many people at the station. Besides the weekend nobody is staying here, so a bit lonely maybe. Will see what happens.
Nowadays I live in Gjerrild (Djursland) and have a big garden there, where I also ring birds and in case you want to know what I catch overthere see www.trektellen.nl and look for the location Gjerrild (RL). The site can be switched among other languages also to danish to make your live easier.
No pictures today but we caught about 50 birds (see table). Half of the birds were robins.

Hope tomorrow will be still good. Later this week we will start already with the autumn. Forecast is not really good,

With kind regards

Robert

Det har været skiftedag på stationen i dag. Henrik er i eftermiddag taget hjem og er blevet afløst af Robert Luttik.
Inden da nåede vi dog endnu en skøn dag på stationen. Netopsætning kl. 04.30 og så ellers en morgen med lidt for godt vejr, da vi kunne høre fuglene trække over Odden i stor højde uden at dumpe ned på Odden. De første runder var som sædvanlig de mest hektiske, men roen indfandt sig hurtigt igen, og vi fik tid til at nørde fjerdragter. I folden og ved hegnene huserede et par sortstrubet bynkefugle, og de brokkede sig højlydt, når vi kom for tæt på, mens vi passede nettene, og et par store regnspover fouragerede i folden. Henrik hørte desuden årets første Tornsanger.
Nina udviste igen stor solidaritet (det hører sig jo næsten til en 1. maj), og hun bibragte os både varm kaffe og nybagte pandekager.

Kl 08.00 dukkede Hans op, da der var planlagt en lille formidling for Silja og familie. Silja er en imponerende lille pige på knap 9 år, som lagde ud med at kunne genkende næsten alle de udstoppede fugle, som vi har i mødelokalet på stationen. Så var linjen ligesom lagt, og Silja imponerede os alle med sit kendskab til og ikke mindst hendes interesse for fuglene. En herlig oplevelse!

Da Silja og familien efter lukkerunden kl 11.00 var draget hjem, slappede vi af i fem minutter, hvorefter Louis fra sin udkigspost på Marine-stationen meldte, at der var en havørn, fire røde og en sort glente på vej ind over stationen. Så var vi i gang igen, og vi gik en tur ud til udkigsposten og fik en sludder. Glenterne gled lidt frem og tilbage, mens endnu en havørn tog den direkte vej til Tyskland, mens små og halvstore flokke af dværgmåger trak forbi Odden. Da vi kom tilbage havde Nina bagt en lækker banankage, og Henrik kunne pakke i ro og mag.

Efter en dejligt aftensmåltid med udveksling af gode historier med Robert var vi alle godt trætte. Det bliver tidligt sent, når man udsætter sig selv for solopgang, havluft og inspirerende selskab.
I morgen venter også en forhåbentlig spændende dag, hvor DMI har lovet lidt flere skyer, så fuglene forhåbentlig ikke bare flyver over nettene. Vi er klar!

Dagens mærkninger (aflæsninger i parantes)

Gærdesmutte (Wren) 2 (1)
Jernspurv (Dunnock) 3 (2)
Rødhals (Robin) 3 (8)
Husrødstjert (Black Redstart) 1 (0)
Solsort (Blackbird) 1 (0)
Gærdesanger (Lesser Whitethroat) 1 (3)
Munk (Blackcap) 1 (0)
Gransanger (Chiffchaff) 0 (1)
Løvsanger (Wollow Earbler) 4 (0)
Fuglekonge (Goldcrest) 2 (0)
Tornirisk (Linnet) 1 (1)

Mærkninger i alt 19 - aflæsninger 16

Vi 'nåede' desværre ikke at tage et eneste billede i løbet af dagen, så vi 'skylder' vist et billede eller to!