Gannets and Bluethroats

Weather at 6.00: NW9, 8°C, 6/8, 20km visibility

While the volunteers took a day off and slept in after their trip to Fanø yesterday, I (Henrik) did the morning obs today. The wind had picked up since yesterday and was now close to 10 m/s from NW. Starting out with low expectations, I was actually quite surprised by the numbers. The gannets (sule) came in good numbers, and this was by far the best day so far this spring (114). And more than that, many came quite close. The morning also gave 2 Black-throated Divers (sortstrubet lom), 3 Arctic Skuas (alm. kjove) and more than 1000 Common Scoters (sortand).

The Little Terns (dværgterne) have also now really arrived. Today there were 26 birds feeding in the shallows, creating the well-known Blåvand sound landscape. Even though the breeding area fence is already up, they paid no attention to this secure area – not yet anyway.

A walk along the “always”-route gave very few passerines in the bushes, but two Bluethroats (blåhals) in the northern part of the bog was nice. Both were males, one mute and singing adult. On the beach, Sanderlings (sandløber) are still present by the hundreds, but almost all adult gulls have now left for the nesting ground, as only few immature birds were present today.