Migration has started!

Migration has officially started now, seeing that at the ringing, for the first time, we had more migrating brids than local birds. Although that is a really good sign, it still was a very slow day for ringing at Kabeltromlem. The night should have been reasonably good for migration and strong winds and more rain are on their way. Birds can somehow detect when bad weather is coming, so they can get away from it in time. This means that there probably was quite a lot of migration going on tonight, only, apparently, birds did not have a reason to stop at our place, they just went straight south. Whatever happened to all the whitethroats (tornsanger) that were in the area just a few days ago, we can only guess. They may either have learned where the nets are, so they can avoid them now, moved somewhere else around the area (although there is still plenty of food for them here!), or they have already started migration as well, in face of the bad weather to come.

It was Sean’s last day at the ringing, since tomorrow it will be too windy. At least, he got to see some species that he hasn’t seen so often this year, like willow warbler (løvsanger) and marsh warbler (kærsanger). Also, in the closing round, we still caught a very young icterine warbler (gulbug), showing that they had been breeding locally. The parents were both around the net and calling loudly, while we extracted the bird. We made sure to ring it quickly and take it back to them. Despite the not fully grown wings, the bird was already very skilled in flying!

Picture of the first willow warbler (løvsanger) this morning - first sign of migration!

Simon junior, meanwhile, was out doing the seabird count at World’s End 3. Again, he had very good views of some fulmars (mallemuk), but not much else to speak of (quote: ”I was there for three hours and had absolutely no birds”, quote two seconds later: ”I counted about 300 gulls, a few fulmars, a black-throated and two red-throated divers, two razorbills…” [look for the complete list in Danish in the DOFbasen link below]). So, despite it being slow, there were some nice species to observe, just not lots of them.

In the email, on the other hand, we had some interesting news from a foreign ringed chaffinch we caught earlier this year: it was a female that was ringed in March, probably on her wintering grounds, in Southampton, England. A little more than a year later it was recovered at Kabeltromlen, on the 31^st of May this year.

After the morning we all went home, and since yesterday was spent doing all the things, we didn’t have time to do before, there was not so much left to do today. We had a nap and then Sean cooked dinner for all of us and the guests from the apartment. Tine has gotten into birding very much, while her mother is enjoying the beach and the beautiful scenery, and her daughter is mainly just enjoying her last days of holidays before school starts again. She did come out with her mum to Kabeltromlen one last time to see the ringing today and quite enjoyed herself.

So this was it for “before the storm”. What happens after the storm, we don’t know, also it seems, a lot more storm is on the way. But for now, we hope that the wind will die down tomorrow evening, so we can catch storm petrels (stormsvale) again, hoping (or fearing) some have been blown our way.

Tomorrow morning should be interesting for sea watching so you will find us all out at World’s End. It will be too windy to set up nets for ringing in the morning.

Ringing  (Kabeltromlekrattet)

Munk (Blackcap) - 1

Tornsanger (Common Whitethroat) - 2

Gærdesanger (Lesser Whitethroat) - 1

Kæersanger (Marsh Warbler) - 2

Gulbug (Icterine Warbler) - 1

Løvsanger (Willow Warbler) - 3

Gulspurv (Yellowhammer) - 1

Total: 11

People: Seán Walsh, Martina Hillbrand, Simon Kiesé, Simon S. Christiansen, Lisa Vergin,  Lise, Tine and Elinor

A link to today's observations from volunteers and local observers.

A link to the results of the latest NocMig-Recordings on Trektellen.