A quiet start but a fun-filled finish

There was a little frost on the ground this morning as we walked to Verdens Ende 3 to start our morning observation and we knew that with the wind picking up again we would not enjoy the same calm and balmy conditions as we did yesterday when it almost felt like summer for a few minutes. With the return of some moderate wind out of the north we also noticed that the very visible migration we observed yesterday had all but stopped.

As the counting was quite slow, Yehonatan investigated two seals out at the point, one living and one dead. Two Common Ravens (Ravn) had already found the dead seal and were making breakfast out of it.

A sleepy, but alive, Harbor Seal pup. (Photo: Yehonatan ben aroia)

After our observations I walked back along the tractor track to look for any new birds that might have arrived there. While I didn't see anything new I did once again find the small flock of Reed Buntings (Rørspurv) that has been there for several weeks, if not longer.

Hanelie had noticed earlier that a Eurasian Green Woodpecker (Grønspætte) had been sighted yesterday near Batteriskoven so she and Yehonatan went in search of it and also for the Common Firecrest (Rødtoppet Fuglekonge) that had been found recently at Ellekrattet. They were able to easily find the Grønspætte and I met up with them after for the continued search for Rødtoppet Fuglekonge. Although we did not find it we did hear a Eurasian Bullfinch (Dompap) calling.

Grønspætte at Batteriskoven

While I have seen many Grønspætte and Rødtoppet Fuglekonge while living in Spain and Germany, I have not seen either species in Denmark and I know that they are both quite uncommon in the Skagen area. One of the resources I used to learn about the status and distribution of species is by looking at eBird (ebird.org). This is a great tool for finding out information on species and it also allows me to easily manage my sightings.

I am not much of a lister, at least a hardcore one, but eBird makes it so easy for me to know what species I've seen where, I can't help but keep track of things. For example, I know I've seen 88 species since I arrived in the Nordjylland region just over three weeks ago. It's also how I so easily knew I had not seen these two species in Denmark yet and that provided a little incentive for me to go and tick them even though I have seen many of them in other places over the last few years. I know there are a lot of other great resources and databases, particularly in Europe, DOFbasen being the obvious example, but it is a great resource for birders around the world and I encourage people to check it out if you've not already.

This afternoon we had a Zoom planning meeting with Simon and learned some more about the things that we will be working on in the coming days and weeks. It's amazing to learn about the diversity of projects that happen here and also impressive to think about the logistics and planning it takes to make all of these things happen. This evening Johanna has joined us, coming from Germany. She volunteered at Skagen in 2022 for a couple of weeks in September and will be here for the month of March. We're happy to have her here to help us out as things continue to get busier each day!

End-of-the-day UPDATE: I finally learned to play Wingspan! Thanks to Hanelie and Johanna for teaching me and Yehonatan how to play this very fun game.

Link to observations from today from observers in the area

Sum of the Raptors in the area based on observations typed into Dofbasen the same day

People: Yehonatan ben aroia, Eric Scheuering, Hanelie Sidhu, Johanna Veentjer