Holding down the Fort

On the evening of the 24th, after the evening meeting , I had a very pleasant walk from the observatory, seeing the short eared owl that’s been hanging around for a few weeks, a few hobbies and several whinchats, and I got to see just how abundant roe deer are here in Skagen (saw at least five in one field).
The morning of the 25th was calm and very hot. The guests (Kirsten and Bomann) left early to attend the Naturmødet in Hirtshals. They were great guests and we had many a pleasant evening with them and enjoyable visits in the field also. The fact that Bomann was happy to cook for us every evening was a fantastic bonus. Hopefully they enjoyed the Naturmødet, and we’ll see them again soon.

For those that were left (just me!) there were a few in-observatory jobs to do, with cleaning and photo archive organisation tasks to undertake. There was no ringing this day, as the weather did not seem conducive to a productive session. It was fairly quiet on the bird front, which is understandable, given the weather conditions and the fact that we’re approaching the end of the spring season.

Late afternoon saw a visit to the cormorant colony for the biweekly count and productivity monitoring. It started quite well, with large numbers of both adult and 2k (2nd year) cormorants, new nests being found and the original nests being well under way. There were also at least 4 red necked grebe nests, one of which at least had three eggs being incubated. Lots of reed warblers were claiming territory, as was the cuckoo that would inevitably parasitise them. However as I approached the northern end of the colony I had a sinister hint of the colonies future. The last monitor-able nest was occupied, not by cormorants but by a fox! Mirroring the events of last year, though perhaps a week earlier, this will probably result in the failure of the colony, though we’ll continue to check them twice a week as some may be far enough along to fledge young, and hopefully the grebes might be able to stay out of the fox’s way . .

A fox that thinks it’s a cormorant. If you look carefully you can see a cormorant egg just in front of him . .