So Damn Hot

The weekend gone by was oppressively hot. Temperatures soared into the low 30s at one point and were consistently around 28 degrees Celsius.

Normally, at this time of year, both weather and birding conditions would mandate a horrifically early start to beat the heat, and encounter birds at their most active.

Unable to manage such an early start, I settled for a little bit of wader action on the old patch at Laajalahti.

Failed breeders and the first juvs of many species are on the move and there were some nice goodies on show. Best of which were some close up Temmincks stint.


Temminck's Stint



A large number of Green Sandpiper, both adult and juvs among them were good for the location, with the Little Ringed Plovers also seemingly having had a good breeding season. 

Other waders included Dunlin, Snipe, Wood Sandpiper, Spotted Redshank and Ruff.
The usual Caspian Terns had yet to have any juvs in the roost.

Raptors included Osprey, Hobby and Marsh Harrier, whilst best of the Passerines was a singing Great Reed Warbler on the path down.

Sunday was even hotter than Saturday, we opted for open country birding, interspersed with a summer Cafe stop for lunch. The garden of this pop up cafe was actually pretty good for birds, and we were able to sit back and watch Shrikes and Rosefinch with coffee in hand.


It's all about berries this time of year. The heat has produced excellent crops with amaing flavour. 


31°C - unbearable


Male Red Backed Shrike - was feeding a full brood. 


This Male Red Backed was getting a fair bit of grief off a pair of Rosefinch. Listen for the mobbing/alarm call of Common Rosefinch in the background

We ended up back at home for the heat of the day, were we enjoyed a cold beer by the lake and an evening of swimming. Only way to survive really.


Olut -  sure how bad.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Finnish Focus On...Taiga And Tundra Bean Geese

Image
Have been meaning to write a post on Tundra and Taiga Bean Goose identification for a while now. Wildfowl are my guilty pleasure. I've always enjoyed looking for them. The escape issue turns a lot of people off them. Grey geese can turn people off further still. Since moving to Finland, being able to spend long hours in the field watching both types of Bean Goose has been a joy, especially considering how rare they are in Ireland.  Tundra Bean Geese are the far commoner species to occur here, making them the easier to photograph and so a good place to start. Tundra Bean Goose Tundra Bean Goose - careful assessment of structure is most important when identifying bean geese. Whilst there are size differences between the smaller Tundra and larger Taiga, this plays out most obviously in their structure and shape. Both species, rear on, can be extremely difficult to pick apart without the structural clues visible. The head and bill structure are crucial in Bean Goose identification. Thi...
Read more

How To Be A Rarity Finder

Image
A recent statistic popped up in my various social media memories.  To date I've been birding on 4 continents, Europe, Asia, Africa and North America, and found rare birds on each of them. Pretty happy with that. 😎 So thought a post on how to go about finding rarities and importantly, how to BE a rarity finder was worth throwing up. They may sound like the same thing, but I have different views on both. One is methodology. The other is an outlook. Combine the best of both and you will achieve your goals. First up, the Methodology . 1. KNOW YOUR BIRDS This is an obvious one (though people may have different perceptions on what this takes.)  It stands to reason though, that to find a Lesser Yellowlegs as a vagrant, you're going to have to know what a Redshank looks like (in all plumages)...and Greenshank ...and Wood Sandpiper ...and then...just to be really fecking sure... Greater Yellowlegs, Stilt Sandpiper and Marsh Sandpiper too. Lesser Yellowlegs - I've found 6 Lesser...
Read more

Racism and Bigotry in Birding

Image
It's hard to pick up a newspaper these days and not read about something the new moniker "alt-right" are up to. The rise of racism to more mainstream levels is undeniable. Do we, as birders, need to have this discussion though? Do we know it's out there, among us? I'm pretty sure we do. It's tempting to believe the best about yourself, and this extrapolates to ourselves as a group; as birders. It's tempting to believe that the hobby of birding, taking place in nature, with a holistic, interconnected view of nature, would not harbour backwards, ignorant, scumbag neanderthals, that would discriminate on the basis of colour, creed, ethnicity, sex or sexual preference...over the past two years I've learned, sadly, that this temptation would lead you to the wrong conclusion. Birding, like any other microcosm of humanity, has it's share of these regrettable people. When I say over the past two years, I mean, perhaps, I have been just as ...
Read more