Little Auks and Glaucous Gull

Hej!

The challenge this morning was to get to World's End 3. This turned out to be kind of difficult, at least for me. The packed, melted and refrozen snow created a really slippery surface, that was too much for me and my bike to handle. I'm fine, but decided to walk the rest of the way. Thomas, Emma and Ragnar seemed to be more skilled to ride a bike on icy snow and made it to the tip on time. We were all rewarded by a nice sunrise, as we settled for 4 cold hours of migration count.

Cold but beautiful start to the observation

There were some good numbers of Auks and Ducks moving and we only had to wait a little over an hour to see the first Little Auk/Søkonge flying close to a flock of Scoters. We all could get a good look at it. In total we saw 4 Little Auks, but the first one offered the best views. Just as Thomas was taking a little wander, to regain the feeling in his toes, Ragnar spotted a Puffin/Lunde flying NW. The good birds just kept on coming, always at the right time to restore our motivation to keep going. A Fulmar/Mallemuk flying close to the shore was nice, as well as a Great Skua/Storkjove flying out to the sea to mob a flock of fishing gulls. We were all especially happy when Thomas called out a Glaucous Gull/Gråmåge. it sat down on the beach right in front of us and flew of 3 minutes later. We could all see it really well. What a cool looking bird!

Glaucous Gull /  Gråmage

After 4 hours spirits were high but extremeties were cold, so we headed back to the station to eat and warm up. The remaining hours to sunset were used by Ragnar and Thomas to drive to Skagen for some food shopping, Emma went on a walk along the beach and I opened the nets in the lighthouse garden. New birds were a Wren/Gærdesmutte and a Robin/Rødhals. A nice surprise was "Marie", a female blackbird that was ringed a week ago and got a GPS-tag. It was good to see that the bird and tag were in good condition and still fits well.

GPS-tagged Blackbird /Solsort "Marie"

Now we are ending the day with a game of Wingspan after we had a nice burger-dinner prepared by Thomas.

Highlights of the observations:

Little Auk / Søkonge - 4

Great Skua / Storkjove - 1

Glaucius Gull / Gråmåge - 1

Puffin / Lunde - 1

Ringing (Lighthouse Garden):

Rødhals - 1

Gærdesmutte - 1

Total = 2

Today’s observations on Dofbasen from observers in the area

People at the station: Thomas Weston, Emma Fabre, Mara Glane, Ragnar Smith.