The day dawned windy and so put paid to our ideas of ringing at Grenen. Not to be put off on their last day, Mads and Joakim went birding at Grenen instead and were rewarded with their first black terns. Michele and I had tasks around the observatory we needed to do, data to input, visitors to assist etc.

After lunch, Michele presented his ringing video, which we intend to use during our guided tours, and also play regularly in the Birders Club once a few issues were ironed out. After this Michele introduced the boys to the different strategies of moult, using a robin, a great tit and a pied flycatcher, a very educational couple of hours.

As it was the boys last day today, we decode to have a BBQ, as the wind had stopped all the other great plans we’d had for last ringing sessions at Grenen and potential tern ringing on the Observatory beach. To this end, Preben and Michele head into town to pick up supplies and the boys and I get the BBQ out and started. It takes a lot longer than we expect, and I have visions of this pleasant evening descending into a scramble to cook burgers inside. It does get started however and we all enjoy some burgers and ribs (and for Michele, sausages as well!)

After the BBQ was tidied up we proceeded to have a shuffleball tournament for about an hour, which ended in no uncertain terms with my victory! Mads took bronze during the runner up playoffs. The wind looks no better for tomorrow so we have no plans to ring until Monday, which means we at least get to see the lads off at 9.

Mads and Joakim getting into moult strategies in the birders club.

The farewell BBQ. When it finally caught.

Today we wake up late in the morning, because we came back very late last night, in fact, earlier this morning, after the night on the beach trying to catch terns. This morning Simon's mother and grandmother came to visit us, but they went away together early in the afternoon. After lunch Mads, Joakim and Preben go birding in Grenen, while Peter and I remain at the observatory for internal tasks, and in the birder's club to welcome visitors. Later, after dinner, and after the daily meeting, we prepare the equipment for tomorrow. We plan to ringing in CES tomorrow morning, but later a wind is rising that is not very promising! If it does not decrease we will be forced to postpone ringing, perhaps until Monday.

View over Kattergat 

Dagen startede for en gangs skyld med at sove længe efter, at vi havde været på natravne-tur i løbet af natten. Det blev dog heller ikke til de helt store aktiviteter denne dag. Mads og jeg benyttede dagen til at udforske området omkring Skagen ydeligre, så vi har snart været over det hele. Vi havde således en tur til Batteriskoven, men det gav ikke mange fugle at kigge på. Dog kom et par rød glenter og lidt hvepsevåger trækkende ind over. Det var også os der stod for maden denne dag så vi var også en tur inde omkring Skagen for at proviantere til brændende kærlighed om aftenen. Peter benyttede dagen til at få tjekket op på ungerne i skarv-kolonien, som efterhånden alle er blevet store. Micheal arbejde på sin nye præsentation omkring ringmærkning af fugle. Derudover gjordes der klar til aftenens aktivitet.
Da vinden så ud til at næsten ikke at være eksisterende denne aften besluttede Simon at vi skulle prøve at ringmærke terner på stranden. Det blev dog ikke til mange terner denne, ja faktisk ikke en eneste, men nu er det prøvet og det skal sikkert nok lykkes en anden god gang.

Today the weather is perfect for ringing.
At 5:00 am I, Mats, Joakim and Preben go to Grenen to open the mistnets. Peter remained at the observatory to undertake his Census experiment.It‘s a very interesting morning, we catch a good number of birds of different species, including two swallows and many young birds born this year. The boys have the opportunity to see different species of different age classes, they are very happy with the morning. At 10:00 am it is very hot, and the number of catches drops considerably. Satisfied, at 10:30 am we decide to close the nets and return to the lighthouse. As soon as we get back to the observatory, Simon, Peter and I make an accurate check on the ringing database, of all the data of recaptures carried out in 2018.

Immediately after lunch we are all busy with the weekly cleaning of the observatory. After cleaning, I get back to work to upload the new ringing data to the database, from the morning in Grenen.

Tonight we are planning to go to ringing the nightjars, so we take the opportunity to sleep a few hours in the afternoon. Later our friends Lars Mortensen and Anders Bojesen arrive, they will come with us to help with ringing the nightjars. While we wait for the night we prepare all the equipment, and watch the semi-final of the World Cup Croatia-England.Immediately after the game we move towards the place for the nightjar, about a half hour drive from the observatory.

As soon as we arrive we erect two mist-nets, we start the tape lure and wait. After more than an hour of waiting, we finally catch and ring a nightjar! It is a beautiful male individual. This species is always very fascinating! After this we take a brief trip around the back lanes listening for quail and corncrake, while we here plenty of the former, we don’t hear a sound from the latter. At 4am we all wearily climb into bed after a job well done.

Ringing birds Recaptures
9 Whitethroat. 1 whitethroat
2 Reed bunting. 1 Blackcap
1 Great tit. 2 lesser whitethroat
1 Blackcap
1 Chaffinch
2 Barn swallow
1 Reed warbler
2 Crested tit
4 Lesser whitethroat
1 Chiffchaff
1 Willow warbler
1 Nightjar
1 Whitethroat
1 Blackcap
2 Lesser whitethroat

Two barn swallows.

Michele ringing the male nightjar

Dagens store indsats blev gjort på Verdens Ende, Grenen. Da Morten, Michele, Preben og Joakim ankom til ca. 8 m/s fra nordøst, som i nat havde været 15 m/s fra øst, blev der talt 180 mursejlere i løbet af et par minutter. Det var åbenlyst, at et stort mursejler-træk var i gang. Dette var ikke noget vi havde forudset; vi havde hået på, at nattens blæsevejr ville give et par skråper eller nogle andre spændend havfugle. Vi talte fra Verdens Ende i perioden 0530-1730 27.310 mursejlere trækkende i østlig retning.

Dette specielle mursejlertræk menes at være et "vejrtræk", hvor mursejlere, måske helt fra Sverige og Tyskland, har bevæget sig rundt om nattens lavtryk og så fulgt den jyske vestkyst op til Skagen hvorefter de, for størstepartens vedkommende, er fløjet videre over til Göteborg eller videre nedad den jyske østkyst. Der blev observeret mursejlere langs den jyske vestkyst hele dagen igennem, så vores mursejlere er kommet langt nede sydfra, måske fra Tyskland og Holland.

Peter har introduceret en standardiseret fugletællingspraksis, som han kalder for "census". Fugletællingen skal foregå på samme måde og langs samme rute hver morgen sæsonen igennem. Alle fugle samt deres adfærd registeres på vejen og man prøver så vidt muligt også at alders- og kønsbestemme dem. Tallene bliver lagt ind i DOFbasen med kommentaren "census" i notefeltet. Dette gør, at vi nemt kan trække en census liste for en bestemt periode og manipulere data til vores behov. Ruten går fra fyret rundt om Storsig-heden til den nye gangbro ved sumpen. Derefter går vi øst langs den nye grussti rundt om Ellekratsøen, igennem Ellekrattet og forbi forbi Grenen P-plads ud til Kattegat. Til sidst går vi langs vandet tilbage til fyret. Vores første censustur gav en syngende Græshoppesanger, Rødrygget Tornskade, Bynkefugle mm.

Af andre aktiviteter kan nævnes, at Simon havde et møde med Kurt, Knud, Niels og Lene fra Venneforeningen. Vi har i dag også behandlet data fra genfangster fra foråret.

Vi tog alle til aften alle ud og grillede hos Anders på Nordlysvej i det gode varme vejr med optil 25C. Anders havde lavet lækker kartoffelsalat til vores medbragte kød og veggie burgers.

Efter et par hyggelige timer hos Anders, kørte vi alle tilbage til stationen for at se Frankrig - Belgien spille semifinale i VM i fodbold. Der blev serveret chips, øl og ciders.

Efter an halvkedelig fodboldkamp gik de fleste i seng og der blev sat natsommerfuglelokning op ved fyret. Da Morten skulle tjecke lokningsområdet morgenen efter, fløj der et par gulspurve op fra lagenet. De har sikkert forsynet sig med nogle godbidder fra nattens tillokkede sommerfugle.

Egespinder

The final tally of the swift passage at Grenen.

One of the 27000 swifts. . .

This morning we had plans to go to ring in Grenen, but the strong wind did not allow it. Joakim and Mads take the opportunity to go birdwatching, while Peter and I are at the birder's club to welcome visitors and work on the pc. At 10.00 am there is a tour guide for a family of 11 Danish people. During the afternoon Simon has a meeting with the freelance journalist Søren Shov. Later, in anticipation of his absence periods during July and August, Simon plans with Peter and me the activities and logistics of the observatory for the rest of the summer. Later in the afternoon Peter goes to monitor the cormorant colony, and a new guest arrives in the observatory, his name is Prepen and he will stay with us for twelve days. Morten prepares excellent hamburgers for dinner, which we roast and eat outside in the garden, until too much wind compels us to return home.
After dinner we have a daily meeting, plan activities for the week, and go to sleep.

Cormorant colony, with lots of almost fledged juveniles.

Juvenile cormorant almost ready to leave the nest. 

The previous afternoon Simon and I had been discussing the potential for improving the recording rate and DOFbasen registrations for the Observatory. I have had experience with undertaking daily census’ for Long Point Bird Observatory, and I thought it would be a good idea to try and implement one here at Skagen. That being the plan, Morten and I were up and out at 6am to start my planned route. It was a very good couple of hours, with grasshopper warbler, whinchat and red backed shrike being the highlights, and not birds I’d expected around the observatory in July!

Whilst we were doing that Mads and Joakim headed up to Grenen where they saw a lot of decent birds, but the highlight of which was a pair of Manx shearwaters passing by. Michele was up and in the birders club, ready to answer visitors questions, and Morten had gone back home briefly.

I managed to head down to the beach for a few minutes swimming (it was very cold) and I settled for watching a few passing terns and ducks before getting the message that dinner was ready.

The boys had cooked up a hearty pasta dish for us all, and afterwards we continued with various data entry tasks. As sometimes happens at bird observatories, washing up was interrupted by the sight of a juvenile black redstart searching for food around the courtyard.

Grasshopper warbler reeling.

Juvenile black redstart

After the festivities the evening before, no one was up early, especially the latest returnees who didn’t get out of bed until noon! Those of us that were up earlier however continued to get on with jobs around the Observatory and manning our information posts at the birders club. We also put the sign out for a guided tour, but we didn’t get any visitors. The boys went out birding earlier in the morning.

Later in the day we were joined by Morten Christensen, who will be staying with us for a few days. We sat and watched the football and then Joakim and Mads came in to say they’d seen a red throated diver ridiculously close on the beach. Morten and I dashed out to try and find it, but alas it seemed to have moved on quickly. We did see some house martins picking up seaweed on the beach, presumably for nesting material? I’ve never heard of them using seaweed before. Before the next football game started I cooked us all a vegetable stew, and we headed down to watch Croatia satisfyingly outplay Russia.

Red throated diver

House matins gathering seaweed for their nests.

Today was the day for CES, so we were all up early, a little earlier than usual as we have to erect two nets each session now to reduce squirrel damage overnight. The net was pretty tangled and took an hour or so to erect but other than that the morning went smoothly. We caught 15 or so birds, many youngsters and a few adults that were starting their post breeding moult, which was an educational experience for all. We also had a pair of red backed shrikes and a common crossbill present at the ringing site, which was unusual and led us to hope they’d go in the net, however they sadly didn’t.

After the CES wrapped up we headed back to the Obs for some much needed sleep. However we didn’t sleep for long as we were heading to the Skagen Music Festival! We watched a great Irish band during the afternoon and moved around throughout the evening, trying to catch music and the football, before heading back in ones and twos to the Obs much later on.

Great tit adult showing postbreeding moult.

Juvenile robin.

Eftersom vi havde været sent ude i går, sov vi længe. Der var ikke meget planlagt og det stod til primært at blive en praktisk dag. Joakim og jeg cyklede ved middagstid til Skagen for at handle mad til vores aftensmad. Vi besluttede os for kartoffelmos med topping og bacon, hvilket var en førstegangsting for os begge.
Ved 15:00-tiden cyklede Joakim, Michele og jeg til skarvkolonien ikke langt fra stationen. På vejen så vi to hugorme, Joakim og min første. Ved skarvkolonien blev der observeret og talt unger i rede såvel som gamle fugle. Optællingen var rimelig hurtigt overstået og vi cyklede hjem for at nå at slappe lidt af inden der skulle laves aftensmad. Tilbage på stationen var Peter blevet færdig med sin video han havde brugt lang tid på. Vi var imponerede, og den opnår forhåbentligt at få lidt flere mennesker ind i Birder’s Club
Maden blev overraskende god, om end den blev en anelse forsinket. Michele sagde sågar at det måske var det bedste han havde fået mens han har været her. Vi gik tidligt i seng da vi skulle op kl. 03:15 morgenen efter og ringmærke.

Juvenile Adder