Parcel delivered

“EXCESS, n. In morals, an indulgence that enforces by appropriate penalties the law of moderation.”

- Abrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary

Many thanks for the one who has kindly sent to us a package of eastern birds!

After some days with the right easterly winds but low numbers of captures (ironically because it was too windy), the eastern species has finally reached the Peninsula. We had been waiting for the Sunday all the week long but not because of holidays (a ringer doesn’t know what they are) but because it was the day when the wind was supposed to drop.

Things finally changed on Saturday night, when we went to twitch a River warbler just south from Malmö. The bird started to sing just 5 minutes after we arrived. Nicer than expected!

The Sunday started quiet, with just a few birds in the first net round. However, there was something magic in the atmosphere. I know it’s easy to say this after the event, but I promise it was! The actual excitement started when we caught a nice female Collared flycatcher. Just to make it even more interesting, the bird had already been ringed, but we still don’t know what’s the origin. All of us did agree a nest-box in Gotland was a good guess.

By the way, the bird was not specially intriguing. We aged it as a 2nd cy based on primary and primary coverts color and wear. The white on the bases of the primaries extended to p5, but p4 also showed a whitish area. With the closed wing, the white was well visible since it was much more extensive than the length of the primary coverts. The pattern of the tertials was very nice, with the large part of the white edge elongated to the tip of the feather, not giving the stepped impression typical from Pied. I find this feature really hard to assess from photos of a bird in the field and it’s always interesting in that sense to refresh your mind while studying and in-hand bird. After a proper analyse of the characters, it was time to relax and enjoy the pattern of the nape feathers. The white line under the grey tip is almost completely hidden, but it’s probably what gives the impression of a collar in a female Collared.

It was then when Jonas decided to leave. What in the beginning seemed a responsible decision of a responsible family man, turned out to be a mistake. Fortunately, nothing that could not be sorted out! 1 hour later, Jonas came back because we had caught an Eastern Subalpine warbler. The bird looked perfect for an Eastern, but it made things even easier when we released and it decided to call. You can hear a recording by Stephen already at xeno-canto.

http://www.xeno-canto.org/embed.php?XC=134173&simple=1

To end with the eastern bonanza, a nice walk around our house produced 2 red-breasted flycatchers. I never get tired of seeing them.

Not happy with that, today we caught an almost perfect Siberian chiffchaff. Buffish tones in the cheeks, complete eye-ring (cream in the upper part), grey back, white undertail coverts and underparts, green fringes in flight feathers, some yellow feathers restricted to the underwing… perfect. The only crappy thing is the extension of the pale basis of the bill. Maybe it’s too extensive, but the shape (slightly curved in the tip of the upper mandible) also points to Siberian. As a gift for our handling skills (despite we took quite a lot of measurements…) the bird subtly called as a Siberian. I say “subtly” and it actually was, but Stephen managed to record it. However, I would not be the spoiler.

The pendulum theory

“We are not going in circles, we are going upwards. The path is a spiral; we have already climbed many steps.”

- Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha

Many things have happened in the last 10 days. The notable changes in the weather had come with notable changes in the quantity and quality of the captures in what can be considered an inversely proportional relationship. In the first days, we were catching many birds. Everyday was a good one in terms of numbers, with some new arrivals too, but the most exciting species were wood warbler, thrush nightingale, lesser redpoll (first for the season!) and red-backed shrike. Apart from quantifying the impressive migration of barnacle geese (up to 50.000 birds counted from Nabben in a few hours), the rest of the day consisted mainly in ringing willow warblers and enjoy the good weather.

As expected, somebody turned off the migrants tap and the number of birds ringed started to decrease. Probably “somebody” means Arvid, whose presence blocked the flux of birds for a few days. Suddenly, we realized the pendulum was already in the other side and there were no birds at all. However, we managed to catch some house martins and to rescue some amphibians stuck in the pit of the lighthouse garden. A common toad, a green toad and a smooth newt (this one a lifer for me!) were, without any kind of doubts, the best of that day.

Arvid left but, while literally crossing the door, he kept on predicting something good for the next days. The weather forecast indicated strong winds and hot temperatures from the southeast and this time it was right. These last days of ringing are among the strangest days of ringing I’ve ever seen. We’ve been catching around 10 birds per day, but surprisingly (or not) 3 red-breasted flycatchers, including a very nice adult male that started to sing after being released. There were at least 5 different birds around the garden, together with some (the first) common rosefinches. If anybody knows the explanation of this high proportion of red-breasted flycatchers, I would be more than happy to pay attention. It’s worth-saying that, until now, we’ve caught 4 pied flycatchers and 3 red-breasted. Nothing else to say.

The hot temperatures have also brought some dragonflies. The downy emerald Cordulia aenea was a lifer for me, but the four-spotted chaser Libeulla quadrimaculata is also common species up there and scarce in the Iberian Peninsula, where it’s restricted to the high Pyrenees.

The influence of the easterlies is obvious but the pendulum is only in the middle. We need the wind to drop and see if the inverse proportion between total number of captures and exciting species finally disappears. If so, it would be amazing. Sunday is the day.

Ode to a wader

“Tell me what you’d like to hear me sing. I’ll sing whatever you like, after which I will take up a collection, if you don’t mind…”

- Edith Piaf

It’s not the first time I’ve realized my life has changed by looking at which species I am targeting at work. One year ago, I wrote a similar post about Laurel pigeon and today, it’s time to take a look to another species that is breeding close to the place where I am living: the Dunlin. These 2 species seem to share opposite fates: while Laurel pigeon is experimenting a notable increase due to hunting prohibition and habitat protection, Southern dunlins Calidris alpina shinzii are declining dramatically.

Everybody knows the Arctic is in serious trouble. The increase of the global temperature together with the accumulation of contaminants is leading most of Arctic species to extinction. However, the firsts changes in their populations can be noticed further south, in the little spots of tundra (or its equivalent southern moorland habitats) where these species do also breed. Sometimes these areas are well-protected and local researchers are not able to explain why the population of such species keeps on decreasing. In these cases, the conservation strategies must be global, acting in the heart of the populations, sometimes in places where a decline has not been noticed yet. This means to study the still healthy populations, assessing their threats, even if they come from further south like contaminants or occur further south like human pressure in wintering grounds. To ensure the main range of a species guarantees its future and it would be the species itself who would send advanced scouts to establish satellite populations in this isolated southern spots of habitat.

I am working in one of those spots: southwestern Skåne. The population of dunlins here is fragmented and declining despite the big effort performed by local researchers. Vellinge Ängar is already my favourite area among the 8 comprising the breeding bird survey. It’s a beautiful wet wasteland, with some channels across carrying water from the adjacent farmland area to the main lagoon. Migrating waders forage along the muddy shore, always in large numbers, while the breeding species display in the middle of the heath. Oystercatchers, redshanks, lapwings, ringed plovers, avocets and of course the dunlins make up a orchestra that plays every morning, even (who knows if especially) when there’s nobody to enjoy it.

In the first visit to the area, I saw 4 males dunlin and 2 females. All the males were crazily singing, but both females seemed to belong to the same lucky male, a very old one ringed (as an adult) in 2006. Males are supposed to take care of the brood and therefore a shorter bill is positively selected, since it is useful to forage in terrestrial habitats. The short bill is also typical of Southern populations C. a. schinzii, so the short-billed impression in males schinzii is quite impressive. Moreover, the date of arrival of breeding dunlins seems to be correlated with bill length and body mass. The pairs composed by a small and short-billed male and a big and long-billed female (like the gorgeous TC) arrive earlier to the breeding grounds, while the pairs composed by average-sized birds arrive later (Jönson 1987). Most of the birds I saw were short-billed males and long-billed females, what make me hope yet another arrival of dunlins in the following days.

Despite this fact, the number of dunlins in the area already represents a remarkable increase with respect to last year’s numbers. A promising breeding season for them, in the end! There’s still a long way to success, but at least the initial settings couldn’t be better.

Displays

“If I hear the music, I’m gonna dance.”

- Det. Kima Greggs, The Wire

Spring migration is taking a breather, with an average of 25 birds caught in the last 3 or 4 days and an almost unnoticeable movement in the field. However, not everything is quiet. Breeding birds are already displaying, sometimes with such an amazing performances. Common redstarts are really busy singing and defending territory in our garden, where yesterday I got the nice surprise of a couple of wrynecks singing and showing well. They seemed to forget about millions of years of evolution trying to become invisible and, sat on a very exposed branch, sang as loud as they could.

A few hours before, in the desertic (literally and non-literally talking) Skanörs revlar, the Red-breasted mergansers were twisting their necks to attract the only single female of the area. The sex ratio in this species is something like 7:1, with most of the schools those days composed by several males and only one or a few females. The competition is hard, and only the chosen few succeed in breeding.

Meadow pipits were also spreading their parachutes, calmly falling from the sky while compulsively singing. There are lots of them, but there are even more Skylarks. An idea for a bird race: how many species can you hear in a skylark song within 24h?

In the way back home, I saw some shelducks already far from the water. I flushed a flock of them in the middle of a pine tree forest and those 4 were sat on a roof. Their place in the pools has been occupied by the coots, some of them with a strong sense of responsibility that lead them to have their nests already built.

Most of birds look so self-confident while displaying, probably a part of their success depends on that. Even thought, predators are attentive to take profit of a risky brave male singing from the top of a tree. Game theory is what is actually driving the breeding success. It’s just the same in birding: it’s good to do your best in the field, but sometimes it’s worth to stay at home, avoiding being tired, waiting for a proper wave of migrants.

Surveying

“I work very fast and steadily, and I don’t hardly ever noticed that I am working.”

- Werner Herzog

The breeding season has started and together with it, the survey on breeding birds. Three days walking and already half of the peninsula prospected. If I close my eyes, I still can hear the redshanks, the lapwings and the oystercatchers singing somewhere inside of my head. However, all the day hanging around means quite a lot of birds, some of them interesting. 2 jack snipes and some ring ouzels have been probably the most interesting things for Swedish birders, but I have enjoyed much more these displaying long-tailed ducks, very close to the harbor

The velvet scoter was still present, this time even closer, what gave me the chance to assess the age and speculate about the sex. The pattern of the outermost secondary, with this funny spot in the middle of the feather, points to a 2nd cal. year, what means the sex is not as straightforward. The hint of yellow in the bill makes me think about a male, but a quick look at the internet gave no result for a male with such a dark bill. In the other hand, I didn’t manage to find females with some yellow in the bill… My theory is that it’s a poorly-colored male, probably in not very good conditions, what also could explain its behavior.

A nice (am I allowed to tell it “nice”?) fox run all the outer shore of Knösen in less than 6 minutes. So impressive, keeping in mind it took me something like 15 minutes cycling. All the birds (and 5 hares) were flushed immediately, what gives an idea of how much dangerous this beautiful creatures are.

Also by the shore, some raptor migration, a pair of territorial red-breasted merganser (pray for me to find a nest) and quite a lot of arctic terns completed the set.

Tomorrow it’s time for Vellinge Ängar. This place seems to be stunning: one of the best preserved wasteland area in southern Sweden and a sort of spot of tundra as fur south. Probably, the last bastion of breeding dunlins have not arrived yet, but, as Stephen said, if there was a jack snipe in a golf course, who knows what could be in such a good place.

Out of the blue

“It’s a strange paradise, you’ll be waiting.”

- Irene, Beach House

What a strange spring… The peak of short-distance migrants has coincide with the first wave of trans-saharians and the sum of both puts up the number of captures. It seems everyday is a good day, no matter the weather, with new arrivals in both the nets and out in the field. Actually, the weather does matter, but scattered showers combined with persistent fog in the last few days led us to the current bonanza. The day before yesterday was one of those days when you feel the more time you are birding, the more species you’d find. A huge arrival of robins, willow warblers and the firsts captures of both pied flycatcher and common redstart early in the morning was a prelude of what was going on. Just after the ringing, I went north, checking the harbor, the little woods by the sea and finally reaching the northern point of Knösen.

The female velvet scoter was still present in the harbor, together with a nice red-necked grebe that offered very good views. Some eiders, goldeneyes, red-breasted mergansers and that was it, but loads of robins and a few black redstarts were foraging around the picnic area. In the little pine forest north of the harbor, my firsts tree pipit and wryneck. Also at least 2 firecrest. I had been told that firecrest was a scarce species up there, but that day I managed to see more than 15. This nice female was in the lighthouse garden, where we’ve ringed 12 firecrest so far, just 2 below the season record.

In the way to Knösen, I saw a female common stonechat, maybe the most interesting sighting of the day. This species is nowadays rare in Sweden, with only a few pairs breeding in a couple of places. A monitoring program which includes tagging with color-rings is carried here in Falsterbo and hopefully would have a positive effect in habitat management. Together with the stonechat, my firsts northern wheatears.

After having checked some exciting forests without any news, I finally managed to see 3 ring ouzels, 2 of them together in the “moorhen’ place”, also known as Skanörs kyrka. My first common moorhen was honestly just a bonus. In the way back home, I stopped to check Flommen, were there are already hundreds of redshanks and pied avocets. Among them, a greenshank and 3 stunning nuptial spotted redshanks.

Today was a complete unknown. It was raining hard at 3.30 in the morning (yeah, just 15 minutes before wake up time) but the feeling of a bad day was in the air when putting up the mistnets. Nothing further from the truth! The robins kept the number of captures at a respectable levels until a rage of willow warblers shot it up. Some common redstarts and a wood warbler colored the morning, while the firsts 2 lesser whitethroats (adults, of course) were the most interesting species from a southwestern point of view.

Thursday means resting bird counts, so I came back to Knösen. The wind has increased and therefore it was not so pleasant to cycle along the coast. However, the migrants were also present; specially willow warblers, but also northern wheatears, the first whinchat and a nice flock of 4 ring ouzels that showed much better this time. In the way back home, a male pied flycatcher made me think about a future collared. Just in a week!

And a happy new yeeeeeear!

“Everybody’s talking ’bout the stormy weather
And what’s a man do to but work out whether it’s true?”

- Teenage riot, Sonic Youth

Here it comes! The good point (sometimes not as good) about the time is that it goes on. After a month complaining with reason about the weather, the spring has finally arrived to Falsterbo. Actually, the weather is still fur from being good, but now we have rain instead of snow and fog instead of wind. The result of this mixture is a huge arrival of migrants. Yesterday, we took over the record of chaffinches caught in a day and set the unbeatable figure in 288 birds. The total number of captures was 501, with 100 dunnocks and some new arrivals such as an adult male black redstar and 2 redwings. But the real spectacle was in the grass around the feeder, thousands of chaffinches were landing, feeding for a while and heading north afterwards. Loads of bramblings and some reed buntings complete the scene. We caught some of those as well, like this beautiful male blambling.

Large flocks of thrushes were also flying over, and so did today as well. I would pay quite a lot of money to know how many birds have overflight the Lighthouse garden between yesterday and today. This morning was not exactly more of the same. The total number of captures was 385, but with “only” 98 chaffinches. The rest were mainly night migrants, specially robins and thrushes, but also goldcrests and chiffchaffs. These adorable little ones are particularly hard to be aged. The chiffchaffs we are catching these days have done a very restricted moult, quite different from that of the warmer chiffchaffs from southern Europe. I wonder if this post-juvenile can be confusingly overlapped with the pre-nuptial, what would kick up a fuss. An then we have the goldcrests, the smallest bird of Europe and probably the one among passerine species that has had a worst winter. However, they seemed to be warming up quickly, singing even from the bottom of the collecting bags while waiting for being ringed. The age is never straightforward, even when there is a moult limit in the greater coverts, in case they can be considered “greater”. An easy way of spotting the two generation of feathers seems to be the shape of the white in the tip of the GCs. Note the step-shaped white in the inner adult feathers, contrasting with the soft-edged white in the retained 2 outermost. Note also the difference in the wear, specially around the shafts.

If you have paid attention to this only-for-ringers subject, you deserve a picture of the whole bird.

Late in the afternoon, I went out for a walk heading east, following the shore while checking bushes, meadows and pine trees. There were thousands of goldcrests, thrushes, robins… the same stuff than in the lighthouse garden. Apart from a nice flock of 19 wood larks (some of them have been also passing throw both today and yesterday), the best was the first common tern of the season, followed by the first little tern. While seeing the terns, a grey wagtail flew over. 3 firsts for the season in a row! The time went on, now unfortunately, and the light was already scarce, so I came back home to pray for another bad weather good day.