Vejrudsigten så god ud. Derfor var vi spændte på, at se hvad dagen kunne bringe. Især da vejret de sidste dage ikke har været noget, at skrive hjem om. Derfor var nettene tidligt oppe kl 04:00. Ddet var Micheal og jeg, som stod for ringmærkningen i dag. Dante, Marie og Hebe stod for observationerne ude på Grenen.

Det var ikke fordi der skete der stor på obs-posten i dag og de 3 oberservatører drog derfor også tidligt hjem igen. Nogle tog ud og kiggede på de rastende fugle i området og andre tog en lur. 

Lille fluesnapper 2k fra i dag

Tilgengæld gik ringmærkningen rigtigti fint, klart den bedste dag vi har haft i et stykke tid nu. Det var nu ikke fordi, at det vrimlede med fugle, men der var da fugle i nettene hver eneste runde. Det gode ved dagen var helt klart artsdiversiteten. Vi fik håndteret mange gode og forskellige artert. Heriblandt kan nævnes arter som skovskade, grå fluesnapper, lille fluesnapper, kærsanger, rørsanger, dompap og bjergvipstjert. Helt klart en mere end godkendt dag! Det er altid godt, at få noget erfaring med nogle af de arter, som vi ikke ser så meget i nettene.

Da vi kom tilbage stod Michele og jeg for en guidet ringmærkningstur i området. Der var 7 deltagere på turen og de var meget interresseret, hvilket altid er rart. Vi fangede en tornsanger på turen, så det var godt, at de fik en fugl i hånden at se. 

Herefter forsøgte Hebe, Marie og jeg, at fange enndu en af vibe-ungerne i området. De var dog ikke til, at finde i dag, så vi må prøve igen i morgen. 

Jan og Kristine, som bor i lejligheden lige nu brugte dagen diverse stedet i området og fik set en del forskellige fugle. Herudover stod de for middagen, som var yderst vellykket, tak for det!

Til sidst ankom også Asger Lykkegaard Møldrup, som bliver her weekenden over.

Ringmærkning på Sardinkrattet og Jennes Sø:

Bjergvipstjert: 1 

Gærdesmutte: 1

Rødhals: 1

Solsort: 2

Kærsanger: 1

Rørsanger: 4

Gærdesanger: 2

Tornsanger: 3

Havesanger: 2

Munk: 1

Gransanger: 4

Løvsanger: 1

Grå fluesnapper: 2

Lille fluesnapper: 1

Musvit: 2

Skovskade: 1

Bogfinke: 1

Dompap: 1

Total: 31

Folk: Hebe Denny, Dante Shepherd, Joakim Matthiensen, Marie Heuberger, Michéle Pes, Simon S Christiansen, Asger Lykkegaard Møldrup, Jan Hjorth og Kristine Vik Kleffel.

Some time after midnight, Marie and I sleeping at last, cosy in our beds.. were woken by an excited Dante telling us something about a Ride (Kittiwake).. Him and Joakim had caught a Ride in theyre wee hand held net down on the beach!!!! We all stumbled out of bed and hurried down to the lab, where joakim put a ring on the stunning bird. This was the first ride ever to be caught at the station, and it was quite an event for us! Aside from that.. what a gorgeous creature... it was something quite magic to see it so close, and look into those dark eyes. After releasing the bird back onto the beach, we all retreated back to out beds in awe. 

Only two hours later, we were woken this time by our alarms, and while Dante and Joakim cought up on some precious sleep, Marie, Michele and i made out way over to Jenne So for CES ringing. The weather was not so much on our side: wind blew and the rain was ready to fall, but it was a good morning, with 10 new birds in the nets, and 9 recaptures. A Grå Fluesnapper, Topmejse, Skovskade and Rorsanger were some of the highlights. The weather came in and we closed the nets, in time to meet Michael Anchor, who let us help him ring eight little Musvit chicks nestled in a nest box near the ringing site.. what incredible little beings!! once they were snuggled back into their nest, we headed back through the now very wild weather! 

Excited by the storm, Marie and I couldnt resist the waves and bobbed about in the shallows for a moment. This was by far our most exciting swim here yet.. the sea is so powerful and beautiful.. Anyway.. after this excitement, ringing data was entered and blog posts etc.. and we had a chat with Flemming downstairs.. and then had a good long nap!!

Our new guests, who arrived late last night, were just in time to see the Ride! and then after catching up on sleep, spent the day walking into town and heading out to grenen. After a delicious Pasta Carbonara from Michele, we all headed to bed. A full and brilliant day.

The beautiful outstreatched wing of the Ride.. so elegent!

dark eyes and freckled brow

Ringing at Jenne Sø and Grenen

Ride - 1

Rødhals - 1       

Rørsanger - 1           

Geardesanger - 1         

Munk - 1         

Gransanger - 1                 

GråFluesnapper - 1

Total 7

  People: Hebe Denny, Dante Shepherd, Joakim Matthiensen, Marie Heuberger, Michéle Pes, Simon S Christiansen, Jan Hjorth og Kristine Vik Kleffel

Today started calm, because of the windy weather, only Hebe and Dante went out to observe in the morning and the camera team went with them. The rest of us could sleep long. After a relaxed morning and sleeping until 7 o’clock, which is super late for us, I went out to watch lapwings (they are one of my favorite birds!). I found them quickly and watched them for a while. I saw two adults hanging around and chasing away some Kestrels (Tårnfalk) and Gulls. I tried to find out, where the Lapwing nest is. One time, I thought I found it, but when I walked there, there was nothing. So I went back to my observation point. And after a while a saw a chick! I was so excited to see it, I have never seen lapwing chicks before! Then suddenly another chick appeared. There two tiny and healthy Lapwing chicks!

Excitedly I zelloed the others and Simon told us, we can ring it. Joakim and Michéle hurried to me and we tried to catch it. After one failure, we changed our strategy. I watched the chick through the telescope and told the boys via Zello where to go. And with this strategy we caught the chick! We hurried to ring it to keep the disturbance as short as possible. It was only 91,8 g heavy.  

Ringing (Storsig):

Vibe                1

Total:              1

Folk: Hebe Denny, Dante Shepherd, Joakim Matthiensen, Marie Heuberger, Michéle Pes, Simon S Christiansen, Jan Hjorth og Kristine Vik Kleffel

Hebe and I heard a Thrush Nightingale at Ellekrattet in the morning. What a beautiful song! At the ringing site Michael, Joakim and Marie caught nice variety of warblers including Garden and Icterine. On the last round they caught a Red-breasted Flycatcher! The rarest bird caught in the ringing this year which was enjoyed by a group of assembled birders who came to see it. In the evening Hebe, Joakim and Simon went south to have a guided tour on waders. 32 people showed up and enjoyed a Grey Plover, some Dunlin and lots of seashells!  I cooked pasta pesto for dinner.

Folk: Hebe Denny, Dante Shepherd, Joakim Matthiensen, Marie Heuberger, Michele Pes, Simon S Christiansen, Daviel Krøyef and Alexander Brucki, Jorgen Hulbeck

Ringmarkening Sardinkrattet: 

Rorsanger - 1 

Gulbug - 2

Gaerdesanger - 4

Tornsanger - 1

Havesanger - 3

Munk - 1

Gransanger - 1

Lovsanger - 1 

Lille Fluesnapper - 1

Total 15

This morning me Joakim and Hebe woke up early to open the mist-nets in Grenen at 4:00 am, the weather forecasts are good, it will not be a windy day and we are hopeful. A little later, Simon joins us.

Dante and Marie also wake up early to go to Verdens Ende, to Grenen, to count birds.

As we had hoped, the conditions are good and we catched a good number of birds, including a Northen wheatear and the first Marsh warbler of the season.

We close the nets at 11:00 am, with 21 ringed birds and 5 recaptures, and we return to the Observatory to rest a little.

In the afternoon I update the ringing data in the database, Hebe proposes a super adventurous experience: the exploration of one of the beach bunkers! We are all a bit disappointed, all except Marie, who feels a little at home. Afterwards we have fun helping Marie with an online species recognition quiz.

Later we have a meeting to plan next week's activities.

Shortly afterwards for dinner we welcome two new guests who will stay with us for a few days to do filming during our work, Daviel Krøyef and Alexander Brucki.

Ringing (Sardinkrattet)

- Gransanger - Chiffchaff                    5                        

- Gærdesanger – Lesser whitethroat  2           

- Kærsanger – Marsh warbler             1              

- Rørsanger – Reed warbler               2                                                                              

- Løvsanger – Willow warbler             2  

- Gulbug – Icterine warbler                 1   

- Rørspurv – Reed bunting                 1

- Tornsanger - Whitethroat                 5

- Stenpikker - Northen wheatear        1

- Havesanger – Garden warbler         1

                                                        Tot: 21

Folk: Hebe Denny, Dante Shephard, Joakim Matthiensen, Marie Heuberger, Michele Pes, Simon S Christiansen, Daviel Krøyef and Alexander Brucki.

Comparison between Reed warbler and Marsh warbler

Da vinden i dag var meget kraftigt, mellem 10 og 12 m/s gav det en sjælden mulighed for, at sove længe da nettene ikke kune åbnes, samt at der ikke er mange fugle i luften i sådan et vejr. Det var vi nogle der udnyttede imens andre trodsede den kraftige blæst og begav sad ud på Grenen til morgenobs. 

Som forventeligt blev det ikke til mange fugle på Grenen i dag. Dog blev der set lidt mallemukker, hvilket nu også forvenligt. Men det var dog rigtigt godt. Det var nemlig en helt ny art for Micheal så trods manglen på fugle var hans morgen rigtig godt. De seje morgenobsere vendte dog også tidligt hjem da de måtte indse, at de simpelthen bare var for blæsende. 

Dog skete der også noget ikke forventeligt i dag! Micheal og jeg havde en ringmærkningstur kl 12:00. Der var ikke mange deltagere, ja faktisk ingen, men der havde nu også allerede været en guidet tur kl 11:00. Men altså, nettene i fyrhaven var åbne og igen resulterede vinden i, at vi ikke fangede mange fugle. Vi fangede faktisk kun én. Men det var dog en lille glædelig overaskelse, som ventede os i nettet. Der sad nemlig en blåmejse MED ring i nettet. Det er jo altid sjovt, at fange fugle med ring, for det er jo lidt hele meningen med ringmærkningen. Det viser sig at blåmejsen blev ringmærket her på Skagen fuglestation i august 2017. Den gang var den en nyudfløjen unge. Nu kom den så tilabge næsten to år gammel som en flot han blåmejse. Det var dejligt, at den ville ligge vejen forbi og sige hej. Vi glæder os allerede til næste gang ;) 

Folk: Folk: Hebe Denny, Dante Shephard, Joakim Matthiensen, Marie Heuberger, Michéle Pes, Hans & Inger Meltofte, and Simon S Christiansen.

Blåmejse 3k han, som lagde vejen forbi efter og sagde hej i dag. Dejligt da vi allerede havde ringmærket fulgen i 2017. 

Today began with the usual cracker of a sunrise and only a little breeze in the air. Michael and Joakim headed out to grenen early, where they opened the nets ready for a morning of ringing. Marie and I arrived a little later to find hundreds of mosquitos waiting for us and the boys armed with repellent and some seriously sexy headnets! It turned out to be quite a quiet morning, but a lovely one, with Hans and Ida joining us for a short time, and relaxing in sunspots looking at insects, listening to Michaels vulture stories and watching out for passing birds in between rounds. We even spotted a beautiful Pirole flitting about between trees at one point! Marie had a very exciting end to the morning, with our last bird being a beautiful male Bogfinke which she had never seen in the hand before. They are incredible strong birds upclose, with so much vibrant colouring! Lovely. We also rung our first Rorsanger, which was a sweet suprise. 

Dante meanwhile spent the morning sat out at Verdens end with Rolf and the other observers, and though it was a little quiet there too, he saw some exciting birds as always in Skagen..! The little bit lost Gåsegrib appeared again, aswell as 2 islom, 2 pirole, a Gulirisk and a sortglente.  

Back at the observatory later on in the morning, after doing some tasks for the day, and spotting the vulture through the obs window...!!!  Marie and i went for a quick and blissful swim in the sea, and then headed off for a wander in the beautiful sunshine and Joakim and Michael opened the garden nets to try to catch some birds for Hans and Ida to see some ringmaerking before they went home. Sadly nothing came to the nets, and it was time to say goodbye to Hans and Ida again. It was so lovely to have them back!! The wind started to pick up in the afternoon and so we all took the chance to take a nap and catch up on a little sleep. I tried to do this on the beach.. resulting in sand absutly everywhere and sunburn. oops. But it was lovely all the same.. i was woken at one point by the call of a Hepsevage passing over the sea.. and interesting suprise!! 

In the evening, our new guests Hans and Inga arrived, having travelled up to the Hirtshalls nature meeting, were simon also spent the past few days. They arrived to a very windy skagen!!! Simon came back a little later on and told us a little about what he had been up to the past few days.. teaching some school classes visiting schools, giving a talk about life vollunteering at Skagen Fuglestation! 

After battling the wind by bike into town for ingrediants, Michael created a delicious creamy mushroomy pasta for dinner and then after some evening wandering we eventually all got to sleep!

Another exciting day in skagen!! 

Sunrise shadows at the ringing tent 

Ringing (Sardinkrattet and Jenne So)

Bogfinke - 1

Tornsanger -  6

Rørsanger - 1

Gærdesanger - 6

Gaerdesmutte - 1

løvsanger - 2

Musvit - 2

Sum: 19

Folk: Hebe Denny, Dante Shephard, Joakim Matthiensen, Marie Heuberger, Michéle Pes, Hans & Ida, Hans & Inger, Rolf Christensen and Simon S Christiansen.

Today was a rainy day and that meant, that we could sleep long – which was really nice! So all of us just stayed in bed until 10 o’clock and after a chilled breakfast we went out to find the Turtle Dove (Turteldue), which was called on Zello. But we were not successful. Around midday our guests Hans and Ida arrived, and we opened the nets in the Garden and caught a Icterine Warbler (Gulbug)!

About the same time the news of the day: A Griffon Vulture (Gåsegrib) arrived in Skagen! It has already been seen yesterday, but about 10 km away from Skagen. First we saw it from the Garden and then it went over the sea. Hebe and I hurried up the Lighthouse, because we thought to have a better view from there and we had. The Vulture came back from the sea and we saw it gliding from above. It came really low and then it suddenly just sat down. Joakim and Dante ran to see it closer and so did we! Unfortunately Hebe and I had trouble to find the right way and then we just went cross-country through the reed. Luckily Hebe had wellies and she piggybacked me over the knee-deep water. After this adventurous part, we joined the other bird watchers – there was already a crowd of people. And by the way, all of them arrived dry there and didn’t went trough knee-deep water. But anyway, we did it! And the Vulture was so close, it was incredible! It just sat there and looked around, after a while it flew a few meters further. It was amazing to see it flying so close. It’s wingspan is bigger than I’m tall. It sat down again and now we only saw it’s head between the grass. After a few minutes some strollers came from the other direction and they didn’t saw the vulture until he flew away – just above their heads! They looked quite surprised :D

After this thrilling event Hebe and I went to town for a swim in the local swimming hall and in the evening Hebe cooked a delicious fish paella for us. The perfect end for another exciting day at Skagen Fuglestation! 

Ringing (Det Grå Fyr and Jenne So):

Jernspurv -1

Sangdrossel - 1

Lovsanger - 1

Musvit - 1 

Bogfinke - 2

Skovpiber -1

Gulbug                                                 1

Tornsanger                                           1

Grå Fluesnapper                                  2

Total:                               11                     

Folk: Hebe Denny, Dante Shephard, Joakim Matthiensen, Marie Heuberger, Michael, Hans og Ida

The morning started very slow but that changed when the raptors started to come. Among the first wave of Musvåge a Blå Glente was found! After deciding it did not want to cross to Sweden it landed in a tree just near the Fuglestation along Fyrvej. It then continued to the south never to be seen again. Not long after a Gåsegrib crackled through on zello flying around near Flagbakken. Wow! Hitching a lift (thank you Nicolas) we raced down to a tower in the klitplantation to see if we could see it. After 15 minutes of desperate scanning there it was. A vulture in Denmark!  This is only the second time this species has been seen in Skagen and the first time since 1985. With good feels all around we headed back to the observatory and I cooked quiches for dinner. A really nice day with two very special raptors. 

Folk: Joakim Matthiesen, Dante Shepherd, Marie Caroline, Hebe Denny

Dagens blog bliver nok kortere end normalt. For skal jeg være helt ærligt, ja så skete der ikke meget denne dag. Faktisk skete der sådanset slet ingen ting. Vi var ellers endnu engang tidligt afsted. Marie og jeg var på Grenen og observere trækket imens Simon, Dante og Hebe åbnede nettene i Sardinkrattet. Fælles for begge stedet var, at der virkelig var fugletomt. Det var meget tåget og i perioder kunne vi ikke engang se fyret fra verdens ende. Det var kun de lokale fugle, som vi kunne se og hører. Det virkede altså ikke til, at der var kommet nogen nye fugle til i løbet af dagen. I ringmærkningen blev det også kun til omkring 10 fugle i løbet af morgenen. Derfor lukkede vi nettene tidligt og Marie og jeg gik tidligt hjem fra Grenen. Sådan er nogle dage bare!

Det var dog en fin nok dag, at det skulle være så stille på. For når det er onsdag er det RENGØRINGSDAG. Så efter en kort lur gik vi alle igang med at gøre hele lejligheden samt laborotoriet og birders club rent. Det kan være lidt hårdt, at komme igennem, men det er altid rigtigt godt bagefter. 

Folk: Joakim Matthiesen, Dante Shepherd, Marie Caroline, Hebe Denny, Simon S Christiansen,  Rolf Christiansen, Michel Ancher. 

Ringmærkning på Sardinkrattet:

Tornsanger: 5

Havesanger: 1

Gærdesanger: 3

Løvsanger: 1 

Total 10

Her en af dagens få ringmærkede fugle, en fin tornsanger.