Our last CES was today! It was quite slow but we had a variety of species. It was really nice to see a goshawk flying really close to us, as well as some waders migrating such as golden plovers and greenshanks.

While Martin was coming to Jennes so, he found a dead Common European Viper on the cycle path, but he did not have a plastic bag to collect it so he decided to come to the CES to find one. He rushed as ever before to make sure the snake was laid where it was found. Once a plastic bag had been acquired he made heist to the scene of the crime. The perpetrator was yet to be unmasked. Then he took the fresh carcass to the laboratory in order to start the dissection. Surprisingly, when he opened it he found 8 eggs with fully developed baby snakes, each was about 16 inches long. It is really sad that these snakes did not get the opportunity to see the light since they were 1 or 2 days away from it. We will keep them in the freezer as specimens.

We also checked out the receiver that Kat installed some weeks ago, to make sure everything is fine. It is a very interesting installation and we are hoping that we will get some data from the birds that will be tagged in Norway!

At 14:00, Martin was presenting to a group of anthropologists from the University of Copenhagen, the Skagen Bird Observatory and the activities of the volunteers as well as how much fun we are having here. 

After coming back from the CES, we entered the data and then went with Christian and Joost up to the lighthouse. The weather was great and it wasn't that windy so we stayed there for some time chilling and chatting.

We had an early dinner prepared by Christian since we were planning on going to the sand dune to watch the sunset. After having the amazing salty and sweet pancakes he made we got ready for our mini road trip to the other side. Unfortunately, we didn't catch the sun going down but we arrived just when it was behind the horizon so the colors in the sky were truly beautiful. We stayed there until it was completely dark listening to the geese, cranes and the wood sandpiper calling loudly. It was a very relaxing moment. Martin was very excited to observe the stars and the satellites.

Ringing (Jennes so): 

Willow Warbler - Song of Songs - 2

Common Chiffchaff - Gransanger - 8

Reed bunting - Tubing - 1

Great tit - Musvit - 3

Garden warbler - Garden singer - 3

Blue tit - Blue Tit - 1

Lesser whitethroat - Yeast singer - 1

Blackbird - Sun type - 3

Common whitethroat - Tornsanger - 5

Total: 27

People: Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, Anders Odd Wulff Nielsen, Joost Van Duppen, Martin Y. Georgiev.

Observations were again the first task for team Skagen. No rare sightings were reported, birds seen included a large number of great skuas, gannets and a few razorbills. After observations Christian focused on the photo archive once again. Our two main quests for the day were cutting net lanes in our new-to-be ringing site and getting Jennes So ready for tomorrow’s CES ringing session. Christina and Christian headed off to town to pick up the electric bush trimmer from Jørgen Kabel! Thank you Jørgen!

Around noon all of us met in the station in order to distribute the tasks between everyone. In the end Joost, Christina and Anders headed for Jennes So while Christian, Yehonathan and I went to cut lanes in the new site. We equipped ourselves with two saws, two grass cutters, two branch cutters and one electric trimmer and set off. The horseflies were incredibly happy to see us however the marvel of human engineering we had with us this time made an immense difference.

A bit of planning, some labour diversification, sweat combined with elbow grease and a couple of hours later the new lanes were ready and awaiting their nets. In the meanwhile, Yoost was doing his best to find some rechargeable batteries in town however sadly without success. Those were required for his night recording equipment.

In the afternoon we went shopping as I needed quite a few things to prepare Mexican fajitas, a favourite food of mine which I was yet to cook for myself. They actually turned out great and we all quite full by the end of it all! In the evening I focused on preparing my presentation for the Anthropology students visiting us tomorrow.

People: Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, Knud Pedersen, Anders Odd Wulff Nielsen, Joost Van Duppen, Martin Y. Georgiev, Jørgen Kabel.

Today we had a very productive morning with many birds during our migration counts at World’s End I. The stars of migration were the Golden plovers (Hjelje) and the Tree sparrows (Skovspurv) which every now and then passed us flying in big flocks. We also saw Wheatears (Stenpikker) which were flying a lot around and sitting quite close to us on the bushes. About 70 Great skuas (Storkjove) migrating over the sea, some Arctic skuas (Almindelig Kjove) as well as Fulmars (Mallemuk) and Kittiwakes (Ride) gave us some nice views. After that we went to the beach to check on the waders and gulls.

When we came back to the observatory it had already started to rain so we did some indoor activities. Chris and I did a small moulting session, Joost working on his project and Martin was preparing his presentation for Saturday. He will be presenting to a group of anthropologists from the University of Copenhagen our main activities at the observatory and he will also talk about birds, of course!

In the afternoon Anders was out again in the rain this time at Grenen for some more observations and luckily it stopped after a while so he had a nice time on the hill.

People: Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, Knud Pedersen, Anders Odd Wulff Nielsen, Joost Van Duppen, Martin Y. Georgiev

Music playing while writting the blog: Anderson Paak & The Free Nationals: NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert

The last couple of days, some rain showers created some larger ponds on the beach at Grenen. Christina and Yehonatan went out there for night-catching and were successful! Just after midnight a juvenile red knot (islandsk ryle) was running towards their torch and got captured.

Early before sunrise, I went to the beach to check for roosting sandwich terns (splitterne) but couldn’t find any. Instead the two juvenile shelducks (gravand) that we found on the beach the day before, were still present. Then I joined the team for ringing at Sardinkrattet. It was a slow morning with only 12 individuals caught in the nets. The clear highlight was a wood warbler (skovsanger), a species that is not ringed that often up here.

While we were ringing, Knud was out at Worlds End 3 and counted migrating seabirds. He observed a shearwater (skråpe), which is always a welcome sight. He narrowed the species down to Balearic or Manx shearwater (balear/almindelig skråpe).

Later the day, the stations team went on a birding trip to Hirtshals, where Simon took a ferry to Norway as he will join our friends at Lista bird observatory for the remainder of the week. We stopped at the beaches in Tversted and Uggerby, but strong winds and little water on the beach made birding difficult. In Hirtshals however, the eastern beach was very wet and yielded a surprising number of different waders (vadefugler). Four bar-tailed godwits (lille kobbersneppe) of which one was colour-banded, three curlew sandpipers (krumnæbbet ryle), one temminck’s stint (temmincksryle) and one Mediterranean gull (sorthoved måge) were the highlights.

In the afternoon, Anders arrived back from his trip to Fynen. The first thing he did was going birding at Grenen of course! His highlights from sea-watching were 25 great skuas (storkjove) and 2 arctic skuas (almindelig kjove) migrating in half an hour.

Today was also the first full day of our new volunteer Joost. He is very happy to have “so many people with so much knowledge about birds” around him and is eager for the next days here at Skagen Fuglestation.

Ringing (Grenen – Sardinkrattet):

Lesser Whitethroat – Gærdesanger – 1

Common Whitethroat – Tornsanger – 1

Garden Warbler – Havesanger – 2

Wood Warbler – Skovsanger – 1

Willow Warbler – Løvsanger – 6

Yellowhammer – Gulspurv – 1

Total: 12

People: Simon S. Christiansen, Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, Knud Pedersen, Anders Odd Wulff Nielsen, Joost Van Duppen

Soundtrack while writing this blog entry: Agnes Obel: Citizen of Glass

Before sunrise we were out to Worlds End III, for migration counts. It was a very busy morning, with many birds migrating or attempting to migrate while even more were resting and foraging in the sea or at the ponds on the beach. A passing harbour porpoise (Marsvin) appeared while scanning the horizon. Suddenly we realized a flock of even larger sea-mammals approaching from the vest. Clearly larger than a harbor porpoise, we saw large, dark dorsal fins of several individuals diving and at one point even jumping out of the water. Dolphins! But what species? A later ask for help for identification on our facebook-page lead to bottlenose dolphins (Øresvin) as the most fitting species. (watch the dolphin video here: https://www.facebook.com/Skagenfuglestation/videos/767326867019338/ )

When we finished the counts, we decided to go and look closer to the huge flocks of gulls to read some ring numbers. While picking up our stuff and scopes, hundreds of house and barn swallows started swarming around us. We were wondering what they were trying to tell us, but in a few minutes, we found out. An extremely unexpected heavy rain started. We had no option than to sit and wait for it to stop. Fortunately, it was quite short, and the sun came out a bit so we could even dry a little. We approached the flocks of gulls from behind the sand dunes, to not disturb them and have a good view of their legs. That led us to one of the best spots for observing birds on the shore, especially when there are puddles on the beach.

All the waders were there as well as terns and gulls. We also observed two beautiful juvenile Common shelducks (Gravand)!

After scanning the pond, we also observed a beautiful whimbrel (Småspove). We realized that it was constantly looking at the sky as if it was waiting for something. After a while we heard a flock of 12 whimbrels calling and immediately he called back and joined them.

In the meanwhile, Knud decided to check-out Skagen Klitplantage in the morning and found two two-barred crossbills (Hvidvinget Korsnæb). One adult in awesome red plumage was feeding a 1K bird and was quite approachable. Knud made some incredible pictures!

Late at night, Joost arrived. He is originally from Brussels but came from Finland. He will be staying with us for three weeks. : )

People: Simon S. Christiansen, Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, Gunnar Simonsen, Anders Odd Wulff Nielsen, Joost Van Duppen, Knud Pedersen

Music playing while writting the blog: Morphine - Like swimming (Full Album)

It’s our first day in Denmark after our flight from Munich landed in Aalborg yesterday. This morning began at 6 am, we were getting ready for our trip to Skagen to visit the Bird Observatory. The team of the Station was up even earlier than us (which is way too early to be honest), counting the birds at the sea while sitting on some dunes. Unfortunately, it was too windy to catch and band or ring birds. So, after we arrived in Skagen we immediately joined the Team at World’s End Number 3. No, we didn’t see Jack Sparr- Captain! Captain Jack Sparrow.

The coolest bird we saw at the Tip of Skagen was the Turnstone. He just kept turning those stones as if his life depended on it. Well, it really depends on turning stones, because he needs to find food.

Another fascinating thing were the Gannets diving headfirst into the stormy waves of the sea. After we finished counting birds for hours, we watched the gulls roosting on the beach, just living their life. We tried to read the numbers on the rings we discovered on some of their legs. We learned that great black-backed gull has ‘Leberkas’ colored legs. (‘Leberkas’ is a national dish in Bavaria. You must come to Bavaria and try it. Now.)

While World’s End Number 4 arrived in form of a gigantic thunderstorm (Thanks Thor) and made us think that we would die – or at least that’s what we thought would happen – we entered the data from the count of the early morning into the computer. After we ate a much-needed lunch, we tried to open the nets in high hopes of catching one or two birds, but life decided to disappoint us and let it rain…again. Instead, we opened a magical freezer and looked at birds. They were dead. That is a weird thing to write, but it was interesting to look at birds so close without them flying right away or attacking us.

After the rain shower, we decided to make a short bike tour to Jennes Sø. On the way there we kind of lost someone from the team. But it’s okay, he was happy in the bushes on his dangerous quest to take an epic picture of a Crested Tit. Very dangerous.

It was a fantastic start for our two weeks in Denmark. Thank you very much for reading this. I suggest you read more of this blog whilst you still can, before I find you. Okay, that was a joke. But if you’re still interested in the work of the Bird Observatory you can click on more entries for more interesting Information.

People: Simon S. Christiansen, Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, Knud Pedersen, Selina Lagerbauer, Lea Krieger.

Soundtrack while writing this blog entry: Original Broadway Cast of Hamilton: Yorktown (The World Turned Upside Down)

Late yesterday night, Martin and I went out for night-catching. In the fuzzy light of the torch, we saw a lump laying on the beach at Grenen. A roosting gull? Careful to not make any sound, catching-net ready, we approached slowly. A little closer the presumed gull turned out to be a grey seal pup!

Not far away, another pup with its mother were resting on the moonlit beach as well. Birds were not captured that night, despite the ponds on the beach looking good for waders, there was little activity. Therefore we will continue to go out for night-catching in the upcoming nights.

The day started with catching and ringing birds at Sardinkrattet with the full team. After the storm yesterday, we were happy to see that the wind had settled down and were hoping for some good catching numbers. The first round brought us a diverse catch of wren (gærdesmutte), redstart (rødstjert) and the first fieldfare (sjagger) of the month – maybe a sign of the approaching autumn?

The next hours however brought mainly willow warblers (løvsanger), lesser (gærdesanger) and common whitethroats (tornsanger). The main highlight came in form of four 1K penduline tits (pungmejse), that were flying over our heads and landed shortly in a bush not far away, but unfortunately did not decide to end up in our nets. This is one of the largest flocks that has been recorded on Grenen in the last years.

Later Kurt, Martin and Yehonatan showed a group of tourists the nature restauration area close to the observatory on a LIFE-tour. Highlight of this tour was this wart-biter (vortebider):

In the meanwhile, a little conference of Danish bird-ringers was held in our facilities. This “league of extraordinary experienced ringers” were so kind to donate a nesting box to us! Simon and Knud had also presentations at the event. William left us after his participation at the conference – thanks for your stay!

Ringing (Grenen – Sardinkrattet):

Eurasian Wren – Gærdesmutte – 1
Common Redstart – Rødstjert – 1
Fieldfare – Sjagger – 1
Eurasian Reed Warbler – Rørsanger – 4
Icterine Warbler – Gulbug – 2
Lesser Whitethroat – Gærdesanger – 6
Common Whitethroat – Tornsanger – 6
Garden Warbler – Havesanger – 1
Common Chiffchaff – Gransanger – 1
Willow Warbler – Løvsanger – 9
Eurasian Blue Tit – Blåmejse – 1
Great Tit – Musvit – 3
Lesser Redpoll – Lille Gråsisken – 1

Total: 37

People: Simon S. Christiansen, Martin Y. Georgiev, Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, William Aarrestrup, Kurt Rasmussen, Knud Pedersen.

Soundtrack while writing this blog entry: The Myrros: Arena Negra

The new day found Christina, Christian, Yehonathan and me walking along Nordstrand trying to catch some waders using hand-nets and a torch. Our best attempt was a ringed plover which was already unsuccessful :(. Here I will quote the great Homer Simpson “Trying is the first step to failure” however we do believe that it is also the first step towards success :).

Expecting foul weather, the next morning we went to bed to properly recharge our batteries. In the morning most of us got up at a reasonable time except for Christina who was up as 7 as usual. In hindsight that is definitely the right time to get up however I feel like after getting up early for a while you always think that sleeping more will make things better however oversleeping also is not a great option - everything must hang in the balance.

As soon as I was up I headed straight for Kattegat for an invigorating swim only to find the waves full lion's mane AGAIN… well, you know what they say: If you can't beat 'em, join' em! When I was done jelly-dodging an awesome avocado-fueled breakfast I was ready for the tasks of the day.

Since it was the perfect day for some indoor work I decided to dedicate myself to the bicycles. Aaah, the bicycle. Such a glorious invention. So precise, elegant, practical, sturdy, eco-friendly and, if that's not enough, good for your heart! What more can you ask for in a mode of transportation?

Chains, chains, and chains again! In my opinion, the bike part which deserves the most attention and gives the biggest payoff when taken care of properly. A metal brush, some elbow grease, a lot of actual grease and three hours later and our four trusty metal stalls were fresh as cucumbers!

In the meanwhile, Christian was sorting the never-ending photos in our photo archive. After that, the three of them set off to Grenen for an afternoon observation session where they saw the two surf scooters who seem to have made Denmark their new home! Howdy partners: D Other sightings included six great shoes and the usual variety of seabirds.

In the afternoon Simon kindly provided his car to help us in shopping for the next couple of days. Ok bikes are amazing but cars also have their uses haha. Anyway after a rich dinner prepared by my amazing gastronomically gifted stationmates Christian and I set off for nightcatching, updates tomorrow :)

People: Simon S. Christiansen, Martin Y. Georgiev, Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, William Aarrestrup.

Another full day for us, starting with the penultimate CES ringing. Although the weather conditions seemed to be perfect for catching birds, the day was slow for the first hours. Fortunately, the variety of species was relatively big than the other times. Highlight of the morning at the CES was one of the last birds we caught, the Cuckoo (Gøg)! A juvenile bird that most likely left its host nest some days ago. European cuckoos have a very interesting behavior when it comes to breeding. Before they are ready to lay an egg, they observe other species nests to find the best one to lay their egg in it. This is known as brood parasitism. Common cuckoos’ appearance is like a Eurasian sparrowhawks’ which is a predatory bird. This is one of the main advantages that the species has in order to make brood parasitism easier, while it helps them get access to the potential hosts. They can lay up to 20 eggs in one season, but they only lay one egg in each host nest.

Other species that were ringed were the pied (Broget Fluesnapper) and the spotted flycatcher (Grå Fluesnapper), a wren (Gærdesmutte), willow warblers (Løvsanger) and more!

Martin, Chris and I, after coming back to the observatory, immediately got in touch with Kat, to go and replace the battery at the receiver where she installed a couple of weeks ago, since unfortunately there was a problem with the first one. This was exciting for us though, because we got to do some biology field work and felt good. So, we learnt how to use the system and read a little the program of the receiver. We now hope that the Norwegian tagged birds will come by Skagen and give some info.

The other cool thing this day was the Harbor porpoises skull that Martin found on the North beach while he was walking in the evening. It is well preserved and when the whole process of cleaning is over there will be a new nice specimen for the lab of the observatory.

In the evening one of Denmarks most experienced ringers William Aarrestrup arrived the Observatory to participate in a Conference for Danish Ringers that from back in time and still today has had a big influence on the history of ringing in Denmark. On Sunday these the participants will visit us here at the Observatory as a part of the event. When it got completely dark, we decided to go for a night catching to the north beach, hoping that the rain and wind would attract some waders. Unfortunately, we didn't capture anything but we will continue trying, since the weather is helping.

Ringing (Jennes Sø):

European cuckoo - Gøg - 1

Wren - Gærdesmutte -1

Common whitethroat – Tornsanger - 1

Blackcap - Munk - 1

Chiffchaff – Gransanger - 2

Willow warbler – Løvsanger - 7

Spotted flycatcher - Grå fluesnapper - 1

Pied flycatcher - Broget fluesnapper - 1

Great tit – Musvit -1

Total: 16

People: Simon S. Christiansen, Martin Y. Georgiev, Christina Ninou, Yehonatan Ben Aroia, Christian Stolz, Michael Ancher, William Aarrestrup.

So after a long way  i arrived Skagen a couple days  ago and after getting some rest, going to sleep early for long day of bird ringing and watching.

so the day started at 4:30 when my alarm woke me up after a good sleep, and after a couple of minutes me, Christina and Martin were in our way to open up the nets in the Grenen ringing site.

at about 05:20 we opened up all of the nets, then me and Martin went looking for some Sandwich Terns-Splitterne so maybe we can ring some rings for our tern project.

yesterday we saw a flock of 30 tern roosting on the beach but this morning we only saw a few flying around hunting for fish but we did not see the flock from the other day.

but we still saw an amazing sunrise on beach and on our way back to ringing site we saw a Red throated loon-Rødstrubet Lom, which was new for me.

When we arrived to the ringing site, Christina and Simon were already ringing the bird.

It was a nice first ringing in Skagen for me and I hope the weather will be nice for many more ringing while I am here.

On the way back the to lighthouse we had a nice view of a cute family of Yellowhammers-Gulspurv

After the ringing we had back to eat some lunch at the station and have some rest.

In the after noon we went to the CES location to put up the nets for tomorrows morning ringing.

I already took a scope with me because I wanted to head to beach later to look for the Surf scooter (Brilleand) that’s hanging here for a while. After we had put up the nets for the CES I went to the beach and started looking for the Surf scooter in a flock of common scooter which was pretty annoying but after a few minutes I spotted in inside the flock and also got a record photo of it ( a very bad one ) and then headed back to have some sleep before me and Christina were going night catching later on.

After a good after noon sleep, me and Christina went on a night catching on the beach which was pretty poor and had not many birds so we went looking for some wader in the little lake near the beach.

When we approached the lake we already seen a few waders flying around and then a Greenshank (Hvidklire) landed a few meters from us in the reeds, we were very close to catch but the bird ended up escaping while we looked for it and almost stepped on it.

On the way back we saw a very cute seal to say goodbye and maybe more luck some other time with the night catching.

Ringing (Sardinkrattet)

Marsh warbler - Kærsanger – 1

Reed warbler – Rørsanger - 5

Icterine warbler – Gulbug - 1

Common whitethroat – Tornsanger - 7

Willow warbler – Løvsanger - 16

Robin – Rødhals - 1

Great tit – Musvit -1

Chiffchaff – Gransanger -3

Lesser whitethroat – Gærdesanger -2

Garden warbler - Havesanger - 1

Total: 38

People: Simon S. Christiansen, Martin Y. Georgiev, Christina Ninou, Yehonatan ben aroia