Just when we thought that yesterday couldn't have been much better, it was. Extensive perusal of mammal droppings on Google Images (it's a s****y job but someone's got to do it) confirmed our suspicions that what we thought were Moose droppings really were and more excitingly the very large number of Brown Bear poos really were lots and lots of Brown Bear poos.
The icing on yesterday's cake came at about 10 pm with a great display of the Northern Lights which lasted for about 30 minutes, Everyone finally stumbled into beds very happy bunnies wondering what tomorrow would bring.
Last nights view from the veranda
Well tomorrow, i.e. today, brought bitterly cold Force 6 winds at dawn with the threat of rain. The school children who were camping in their lavvus (look it up) and were expecting to come for another visit immediately realised the error of their ways and packed up and went home. We were about to do the same as there was no obvious passage going on and most of the nets were very exposed. Then out of nowhere Redpolls started to drop in. We only had four of our 18 nets that were sheltered enough to open but managed to quickly cut another net ride and set a net and then retreat into our own lavvu. In the end we we had a fantastic day given the conditions and the limited number of nets. Redpolls were everywhere and we ended up with 167 Common Redpolls - around 70% of all the birds ringed. In contrast to our first two days there was barely a Meadow Pipit to be seen. Highlights of the day were an adult male and a juvenile Arctic Redpoll - our first of the week.
Adult Arctic Redpoll
Adult Arctic Redpoll (L) with Mealy (R)
Adult Arctic Redpoll (L) with Mealy (R)
Adult Arctic Redpoll
Need to sign off now as we have still to do the log and as one of our party says we can't log until we've blogged (see above)
The 259 birds ringed today were -
Common Redpoll - 167
Reed Bunting - 44
Meadow Pipit - 21
Dunnock - 7
Great Tit - 5
Willow Warbler - 5
Bluethroat - 3
House Sparrow - 2
Arctic Redpoll - 2
White Wagtail - 1
Fieldfare - 1
Brambling - 1
Sunset on Varangerfjord
Great effort again team--smashing pics ( Jan says thanks so much for the Lights pic.........)! A couple of maybe dodgy days weather-wise coming up--but looks great for the final stretch so hope you hammer the Mipits again. They have started here--26 today--I know it's pathetic but we are pleased. Got a feeling that this may be the first rude word text day.....hope so
ReplyDeleteCheers Col
PS I guess you have realised this already but over the last couple of days you will have ringed the 10,000th bird at the Nesseby site--not bad for a new site and such a sparse coverage. Great work. Col
ReplyDeleteWe caught Mipiits today as well and gave them to the trainee. You are getting some great numbers and I hope they keep coming for you all. You may get lucky and see the bear as well.
ReplyDeleteCharlie