Alix on her own at Blåvandland

Observations:

The highlight of this morning was spotting three arctic skuas – parasitic jaegers [almindelig kjove]. The first one was migrating south, whilst the other two were feeding near the shore before heading north.

I was really happy because this spring I’ve seen quite a few skuas flying over, and it was a first for me!
For my final week of observations, I’m still looking forward to spotting more of them – and why not another pomarine skua [mellemkjove] (we can dream, can’t we?) :)

Todays observations can be seen here.

Ringing:

My first ringing session alone went very well, though it was tiring to walk all the rounds alone, as the site here is quite big and spread out.

Not a big number of birds, but some highlights for me were a Starling (Stær) which was my first ever and it was really fun to study, as well as a partially leucistic Lesser Whitethroat (Gæardesanger).

Male Starling (Stær)

Partially leucistic Lesser Whitethroat (Gærdesanger), with some white feathers on the crown and back. Very interesting individual!

Towards the end of the standard time, the wind picked up quite a bit so the closing time fit very well as it was becoming a bit too windy for my liking for the birds comfort in the nets.

I have now done all the computer work needed for the day and will go have a nap!!

See you tomorrow for more little birds!

Little tern project:

Compared to the past few days, today was a fine day for observing the little terns. It was a bit cloudy and the wind had picked up to 7 m/s.  A total of 6 little terns were flying around and landed in the fence 10 times. All of the landings took place on the north side of the enclosure, which is noteworthy, given that all previous landings had mainly occurred in the middle of the fence. Hopefully in the next few days their numbers of Little terns keep going up.

At the station : Clara Delahaye, Jorn de Jong & Alix Bortolussi