A beautiful sunrise over the bog today. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

Morning observations:

Today was a very nice morning at the observation. I did saw quite of lot of Sandwich terns “Splitterne” again. It looks like there are coming more of these each day. Other than that, the morning observation was not really different form other mornings. But it was still a nice morning!

Todays observations can be seen here.

After the morning observation, Joseph and I joined Hanelie with the ringing! I ringed a Song thrush “Sangdrossel”, a Robin “Rødhals”, Chiffchaff “Gransanger” and a Great tit “Musvit”. It was a really nice day!

The ringing:

Equipped with a bag of freshly washed bird bags – I had washed them yesterday – I started the first round this morning at 06:45 after I had opened all nets and looked at some moths and ate a little breakfast between opening time and first round.

Every round I had some, but not many birds. At 08:30 I woke up Joseph from his dreams, who had enjoyed some more sleep today, because I had a Starling “Stær” in the net, a species that he did not see in hand before and they are really beautiful to see from very close. We wanted to take a nice picture in the sun, so you could see all the beautiful shimmering colors of its plumage. The Starling “Stær” commented this with loud screaming, it can be a very noisy bird in hand. But we managed to get a star picture of it. As a reward, it got released and joined two other Starlings right away and we could watch them sitting on the tops of three trees, until they took off again.

Starling "Stær". Picture: Joseph Stephan

Joseph was also amazed of a beautiful 3k+ male Chaffinch “Bogfinke”, that I showed him through the window, so I decided to put a picture of it in the blog.

Chaffinch male/ Bogfinke, han. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

Nets were open two more hours after standard time, there were still some birds and Marit and Joseph wanted to join on some rounds. We had two late flying Songthrushes “Sangdrossel”, usually I just get them in the nets in the first two rounds, so both Marit and Joseph could ring one.

The moths

I had nine moth species today and when I checked yesterday evening before going to bed. Besides many Xylocampa areola “Gedeblad-ugle” I also had many Cerastis rubricosa “Okkerrød Aprilugle” today. There was one new species for me, which was Orthosia cerasi “Rødgul forårsugle” and I was happy about Biston strataria “Broget vintermåler”, which was a bit hidden under the small windowsill of the lab window. It is a very beautiful moth, I think.

Orthosia cerasi “Rødgul forårsugle”. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

Biston strataria “Broget vintermåler”. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

There was also one caterpillar of Xestia xantographa “Gulmærket glansugle” next to the trap. I think they might also be attracted to the light, but usually don´t come, as they are not that mobile as the adult moths of course, without wings.

News from the station:

Bjørn and Andreas arrived for a spontaneous visit for the weekend at the station, it was a nice surprise to see them again. Now they went out to a plantation with Marit and Joseph to listen to Tengmalm´s owls and I heard they were successful!

I decided to stay here, there was still data to enter and to get some more sleep, tomorrow will be an early morning with good weather again.

At the station: Joseph Stephan, Marit Nillissen, Andreas Pedersen, Bjørn Frikke, Hanelie Sidhu

Morning observations:

Today was a beautiful morning with a blue sky and sun from the get go and only 4m/s from east. The first three periods of standard time had been a pleasure. There was a decent number of Gannets migrating southwards as well as one of my favorite duck species, the Common Scoter. In the last period a adult Gannet blessed me with its appearence - it was foraging quite close to the shoreline showcasing their amazing abality to plunge-dive. That was definetly my highlight from the obs today. :-)

All observations from today can be seen here.

morning obs, Photo: Joseph

When I came home from the obs I treated myself to a warm cup of coffee and chatted with Bent. Afterwards I prepared myself for the interviews regarding the Little Tern Project.

By now I almost talked with a 100 people here at Blåvandshuk, they all seem to be concious about protecting nature. Even though some might be talking more then actually doing it. 

The ringing:

An update on yesterday: We did not catch any owls “ugle”. But it was quite a good number of birds this morning. In total it was 31 birds, in most rounds a few, so it was a quite relaxed day with beautiful weather. Joseph joined me on two rounds after the morning observations and ringed his first two birds since 2023, a Robin “Rødhals” and a Dunnock “Jernspurv”. He especially liked the Dunnock “Jernspurv”. It is a very common bird in the gardens, especially at that time of the year, and the species we caught most so far in this season, 94 Dunnocks “Jernspurv” have been ringed until now.

During the last days, I had quite a lot of recaptures, it was just two today, so I assume the birds took advantage of the mild night and continued their migration to their breeding grounds.

There were 4 Lesser Redpolls/ Lille Gråsisken in the nets today. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

The moths:

Being up until a bit after 23 o´clock (I had a nice long nap in the afternoon) in the so far mildest spring night we had has one advantage, even if you do not catch an owl: We regularly passed the moth trap in the lighthouse garden. Most moths stay in the trap or on the wall of the lab, but of course some also fly away again, so there might always be some that you missed when you check the trap in the morning. Passing the trap that often while it is dark means to miss just very few moths, and I already had quite a lot of species in the night. But the big surprise came in the morning, when I checked the trap and the wall after opening the nets. Cerula vinula “Hermelinskåbe” was on the back of the bench! Last year I caught that species in June, I was not expecting to catch it now, it was a nice surprise, it is a beautiful big moth. I read it up in my Moths field guide, they write it´s fight season starts in May, it is a quite early record, I found observations of it in April on Arter, but from mid to end of the month. In total I had 10 species, I hope that will continue the next days!

Cerula vinula “Hermelinskåbe”. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

Earophila badiata "Brungul bladmåler". Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

At the station: Bent Jakobsen, Joseph Stephan, Marit Nillissen and Hanelie Sidhu

A new arrival in the garden: The Snowdrops "Vintergæk" withered, but the Wood anemones "Hvid anemone" are flowering now! Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

Morning observations:

I went to the morning observation at 6:45. It was a really nice morning, not windy and the visibility was great! I saw quite some Sandwich terns “Splitterne” this morning! They were diving in the sea and some were migrating. I also saw a flock of 30 Greater white-fronted geese “Blisgås”. After two hours, the migration started to slow down. But luckily, the Sandwich terns were still diving in the sea, so it was fun to look at!

Todays observations can be seen here.

After the morning observation I went to Hvidbjerg Strand again to collect some dead birds for Levi’s project. But unfortunately I couldn’t find any. Luckily the weather was really nice, I even took my jacket off because it was too warm.

The ringing:

So today the 2^nd of April and DMI did not fool us again, the weather was as it had forecasted it, low wind and sunny from sunrise on. Still very cold when I opened the nets. There must have been some moisture in the air during the night which froze on the nets. That made it a bit difficult to open the nets and in the first rounds, I still had some icy little parts in the nets the first rounds until the sun melted it during the morning. It was not a busy day, but I had quite a good round at 11:00, so I decided to do one more round before and then decide whether to close or not. It did not bring any new birds, so I closed at 12:00. My highlight of today was the fourth Blackcap “Munk” for the season. Like the three before, it was a male, I am curious when the first females are arriving.

Blackcap, male/ Munk, han. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

The Chiffchaff "Gransanger" was the bird that was caught most often today. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

Now it is evening, the sun already went down, and we are trying for owls, there are no owls breeding at Blåvandshuk, birds coming out here are migratory birds, so it is okay to attract them by sound at that time of year.

Let´s see if we are lucky this time.

The moths:

There was one new moth species for me in the trap this morning. It was Cerastis rubricosa “Okkerrød Aprilugle”, two of it, we are at the very beginning of their flight season.

Cerastis rubricosa “Okkerrød Aprilugle”. Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

Besides that, I had again Xylocampa areola “Gedeblad-ugle”.

Little Tern project:

In the afternoon I deep cleaned Bents office because I wanted to move into the room – in the process I found a very interesting book. It looked very old - when I wiped off the dust I realized that I just found a hidden gem. It was the old landscape plan for Ribe. The maps and illustrations looked like they were handmade. I was quite intrigued by it therefore I started reading through the danish text. It is crazy to think about the fact that back in the 80’s there was no forest at Blåvandshuk at all.

After a nice cup of coffee and an italian lunch I went out to do some interviews. Today the Nationalpark was less busy then yesterday. I got answers from around 30 germans and 5 danes. It is fun to practice my broken danish and have conversations with the locals.

Before dinner I went out to see if there are any migratory birds over the sea – I was lucky enough to observe 35 scoters flying south. ;-) Additionally 2 Sandwich Terns blessed me with their presence. 

At the station: Joseph Stephan, Marit Nillissen and Hanelie Sidhu

Morning observations:

This morning looked fine at first for the morning observation. But there was not that much migration going on. After 1,5hours the visibility got really bad, I couldn’t see the sea anymore! So unfortunately I headed back to the station after 1,5hours.

Todays observations can be seen here.

The ringing:

We were expecting a beautiful morning when we checked the weather on DMI yesterday evening. It showed sun from sunrise the whole day and nearly no wind. When I went out to open the nets at 5.30, there was a thin icy layer on the poles and frost on the ground and on some of the nets. It was a cold start of the morning. When it got light, it turned quite foggy soon and from the station, I could sometimes hardly see the lighthouse. There were very few birds flying in this weather. In the first round, I had a few birds, among them a beautiful Redwing “Vindrossel”.

Redwing "Vindrossel". Picture: Hanelie Sidhu

The second round brought just some recaptures and after, a few zero rounds followed. At least I saw two Cranes “Trane” flying over the station garden and disappearing in the fog, that was quite nice. In the last two hours it cleared up but there were not many more birds flying, so I closed the nets. Bent had arrived at the station and came with me to the lighthouse garden to put up two nets that fell down this morning when I wanted to open them, as the stabilizing ropes just slipped down on the icy pole. Now I have all the nets again for tomorrow which is good.

Bent was planning on going for a walk on the beach, but there was fog over the sea again, so he just did a short walk and found a pretty adult male viper “Hugorm” in the part of the bog that was open, just on the other side of the station.

Adult male viper/ Hugorm ad han. Picture: Bent Jakobsen

Interviews Little Tern Project:

While Bent was out taking a walk, I gathered all the material that John F. gave me two weeks ago (flyers, nationalpark guides and uniform) as well as the printed versions of the interview sheet. The questions asked were discussed before with all the stakeholders of the project. 

Marit and Hanelie were kind enough to help me with the interviews to do the job in the most efficient way. We positioned us at the most northern entrance of the Nationalpark. We did 1h of interviews which resulted in a total of 41 tourists and 3 danish locals - that we asked 8 questions each, about their knowledge regarding dog leashes and their experience with the info signs as well as the fencing for the Little Terns.

Interviewing tourists; Photo: Hanelie

It was very fun and I am thankful that Marit and Hanelie joined. The Nationalpark Vadehavet uniform is fitting all of us quite well. Thank you John! :-)

For dinner Hanelie prepared a delightful vegetarian dish and salad that we enjoyed with every single bite - it carried us to our well deserved beds.

Let’s roll the dice and see what tomorrow’s got in store!

At the station: Bent Jakobsen, Marit Nillissen, Joseph Stephan, Hanelie Sidhu