What a night! A Leach's Storm Petrel (Stor Stomsvale)!

Hej out there!

The night from Tuesday to Wednesday, we set up the nets to catch Storm Petrels (Lille Stormsvale) and Nightjars (Natravn) again. It was my first night shift here at the Bird Observatory in Skagen and I was really looking forward to it. Checking nets at the beach at night, while the stars are glowing above you and the light tower throws its light on the beach is just extremely special and beautiful.

We set up three nets at the beach and positioned a speaker at each of them. Two speakers played Storm Petrel's sounds while one produced a mixed sound selection of Storm Petrel, Leach's Storm Petrel and Swinhoe's Storm Petrel (Mørkrygget Stormsvale)

To one of the two Nightjar nets there was also a speaker added, which played Nightjar sounds

My shift started at 10 PM. For the first hours our guests Pia, Henrik and Jan joined us. Unfortunately, this period only provided us empty nets. Karin, Hanelie's mother was a bit more persistent, but after the net round at 1:15AM she left as well. What a pity!! Because at around 2 AM the first bird was caught! It all started with a juvenile Dunlin (Almindelig Ryle) I was extremely happy as I haven't had too many waders in my hand yet. Nevertheless, I decided not to change one sound file into wader sounds yet to give the Storm Petrels a bit more time.

I rang Frank we rang the Dunlin and Frank could lay down again. However, he couldn't rest for long because an hour later another bird in the nets at the beach was caught.

I was very excited and thought we finally caught a European Storm-petrel. I have just seen a black bird with webbed feet. I immediately called Frank again who ran down at the beach in a few minutes. That's the point where everything started: the bird seemed too big for a European Storm-Petrel. It was too big for a European indeed, because it wasn't one...  It was a Leach's Storm-Petrel!

Extremely excited we rang Simon. He must have jumped out of his bed really fast when he got the message.

Leach's Storm Petrels were only ringed 6 times in Denmark prior to this record, but the previously ringed birds were all individuals brought in by ships or found accidentaly on land. Read more about these in this article (in danish).

The European breeding colonies are limited to a few small islands, like Ireland, Iceland, the Faroe Islands and the West coast of Great Britain.  They are only coming to the land to breed, the rest of their life they spent over the oceans.

Its the 54th Leach's Storm Petrel observed in Skagen, but the first time ever in Denmark that a bird is caught in a mistnet.  

What a great success to catch it here at the bird observatory! A few birders of Skagen were informed and were joining the ringing and photo session of this wonderful bird.

At 5 AM, when I was actually out to close the nets, we trapped a Nightjar. And on the beach in the Storm-petrel nets, a Common Ringed Plover (Stor Præstekrave) was caught.

In addition, we were rewarded with a beautiful sunrise. What an impressive, beautiful and successful nightshift!

 

While I was going to sleep, the rest of the gang went ringing. All in all ringing was slow. The highlights were a juvenile Great Spotted Woodpecker (Stor Flagspætte), a few Redstarts (Rødstjert) and the first two juvenile Goldcrests (Fuglekonge) of the autumn season! 

Migration count was slow as well. Common scoters  (Sortand), Velvet Scoters (Fløjlsand), Yellow Wagtails (Gul Vipstjert), Tree Pipits (Skovpiber) and some shorebirds were observed.

Today night, we will set up Storm Petrel and Nightjar nets again. Stay tuned- maybe there is a Swinhoe's Storm Petrel in the net;)

Ringing (Kabeltromlen):

Stor Flagspætte: 1

Rødstjert: 2

Grå Fluesnapper: 2

Løvsanger: 1

Munk: 1

Tornsanger: 1

Havesunger: 1

Fuglekonge: 2

 

Ringing (Grenen):

Almindelig Ryle: 1

Stor Stormsvale: 1

Natravn: 1

Stor Præstekrave: 1

Total: 15

Observations of the day in DOFbasn from observers in the area

People: Max Laubenstein, Hanelie Sidhu, Frank Osterberg, Elena Turac, Simon Christiansen, Karin, Pia, Jan, Henrik.