Hel Hath No Birdies

Last Father's day I received a fantastic gift "from my daughter". One of those gifts which I have a sneaking suspicion is just as much for my wife as myself. 😁 After sourcing all the necessary materials to get it functioning, we set it up overlooking the feeders. Whilst not massively impressive tech in regards to image quality, it has been very interesting to know what goes on during the night at our feeding station. White-Tailed Deer have been raiding the feeders at night. We've even seen them tipping one of the feeders to knock peanuts to the ground. Plenty of Hares coming in for the oats.  One of the 3 local cats.  Getting the camera to do what we want is complex with the myriad of settings available, and consequently we have been experimenting a lot. The camera paid off massively in the wee hours of Saturday morning. At 01.33 this Hare triggered the camera, feeding on spilled sun flower seeds and grai

Father's day weekend means lots of plans made. And with poor weather inbound I planned to combine some birding with being in the city. Myself and Lyra made for the Helsinki shoreline, where some Two-Barred Crossbills had been hanging out. With Ireland's first Two-Barred warbler having shown up in shady circumstances involving Kieran Grace, Jim Dowdall and Killian Mullarney (Shame Shame Shame), it's worth remembering there's only one Two-Barred worth mentioning 😈. The usual larches were holding a mixed flock of Crossbills and it was surprisingly difficult to sift through the birds in quite dense trees. First up was this Wing-Barred Common Crossbill. Birds like this can be eye catching, and can fool you temporarily when tumbling about at the tops of trees. Note the colour bleeding into the wing bars. Asymmetric tertial tips, with colour bleeding along feather fringe. Fairly chunky structure Usually when I visit

With a day off Friday, and beautiful weather, I set out hunting for Pine Grosbeak. There has been a major push of them in Scandinavia, but here in the rest of the Nordics we have seen nothing like those numbers. there is always a few this time of year, however, though they can be few and far between. With two up the road on Lauttasaari, I decided to first try my luck at digging out my own in Masala, before moving on to try and connect with the two birds in Helsinki. My first stop was at a housing estate in Masala, laden with Rowan berries. The crop has been excellent this autumn and there have been huge numbers of Waxwings. I have been noticing where flocks of them have been frequenting, hoping they would attract in some grosbeaks. A small flock of some twenty birds was here, along with good numbers of Blackbirds and Fieldfare, and 3 late Common Starling. Well marked female Blackbird. There seems to be a greater tendency towards what I call "Hepatic" B