. . Lintuharrastajan päiväkirja Birders diary . .

On the 5th of October the weather was bad but the company was good as I spent my lunch-hour with Jussi Valonen and O-P Pietiläinen on the dam-road. We saw a flock of Brent Geese, a flock of Long-tailed Ducks, some Greater Scaups, White-tailed Eales and Waxwings and so on. On the 6th day I didn’t see much but in the evening we went to check some fields and ringed a Teal, a Jack Snipe + a control, 3 Woodcocks, 2 Common Snipes and surprisingly a Long-eared Owl. On the 7th day I saw just a Rough-legged Buzzard and a couple of Merlins.

On the 8th of October we did duck-counts in Siikalahti and saw 3 Tundra Swans, 299 Whooper Swans, 4700 Barnacle, 60 local and 215 migrating Greater White-frontes, 284 Tundra Bean Geese and a Taiga Bean Goose, 18 Smews, a Greater Scaup, 4 Gadwalls, 474 Wigeons, 459 Mallards, a hybrid Mallard x Pintail male and so on. I found again a new Great Grey Owl too. On the 9th day the only bird to mention was a Great Egret.

On the 10th of October it was raining. So we got out only later and headed to Saari. But then it started to rain again. In Akanvaara Tetrisuo we were discussing that if there was a rare wheatear somewhere, it surely was hiding from the rain. So we checked the fields just quickly and kept on going. After all we found just a family of Tundra Swans in Jyrkilä and some Goldfinches and Linnets. In the evening the weather was better and we headed to fields again and caught 2 Barnacle Geese, a Wigeon, a Teal, 4 Jack Snipes, 5 Woodcocks and 3 Common Snipes. We also saw a Short-eared Owl, 2 Long-eared Owls, a Tawny Owl and a Ural Owl.

It was raining on Sunday too. We had planned to go to watch migration to Lake Saimaa but we got out again later and headed to Varpavaara. Geese were migrating far in the west and in Punkaharju other birders saw also 2 Yellow-billed Loons – and we had planned to go there… We saw only a couple of Rough-legged Buzzards, a flock of Long-tailed Ducks, 2 Woodpigeons and so on.

And then I got a phone-call from Jouko Rantanen that he had found a good-looking wheatear exactly where we had been on the previous day, in Saari Akanvaara Tetrisuo. We had to go to help with the identification and once we got there the bird was missing. Luckily I found it a few hundreds of meters from the place where it had been and it was exactly what Jouko also had already thought it was – an Isabelline Wheatear! Another new species of wheatear for Parikkala on the same field in a couple of weeks!

Soon the wheatear flew to the same place where it had been found and we tried to get some better pictures of it. But it was extremely shy and was running and flying too far all the time. After all we had to give up trying and let the bird be as there were twitchers coming to see this 5th Isabelline Wheatear for South Karelia.

We continued our trip to Lake Saimaa and Savonlinna Punkaharju Hirvikoski where a Yellow-billed Loon had dropped to swim and had still been there when the birders had left an hour before. But it was a long drive and once we got there we found just a single Black-throated Loon. We were checking the lake for a couple of hours and saw at least 3 Saimaa Seals, about 100 Long-tailed Ducks, 4 Common Scoters and finally a flock of loons landed a bit nearer but they were all Black-throated and Red-throated Loons. After all we had o give up.

On the first days of the week there were again Yellow-billed Loon but also a Great Northern Loon seen in Punkaharju – but I was at work. On Monday the 12th of October I saw 3 Rough-legged Buzzards and 25 Black-throated and 2 Red-throated Loons in Siikalahti. Afetr work I decided to drive to Akanvaara Tetrisuo to try to get better pictures of the Isabelline Wheatear. Together with twitchers from Joutseno and Imatra we packed into one car and tried to get closer to this shy bird by car. And surprisingly it was very easy to approach and we got really good pictures. It will be much easier to make description to rarity committee now.

In the evening we went again to fields and we went to check one new field that I hadn’t visited earlier even in daytime. It was really good and we caught altogether 7 Jack Snipes + saw 4 more, 2 Woodcocks and 3 Common Snipes. We saw a Lynx again on the same field and this time we managed to sneak to less than 10 meters to watch it. I also managed to get a Ural Owl to my net but then the net got stuck to branches and the owl escaped.

Otherwise it was quiet during the week. Mornings and evenings are already dark. On the 14th of October we went to fields again in the evening. Erkko Elonen was with us so we started with a successful Lynx-twitch. We caught 4 Jack Snipes (saw 4 more), a Woodcock + another controlled and 4 Common Snipes. We also saw a Short-eared Owl and the same Ural Owl again. On the 15th day on my lunch-hour I saw a flock of 13 migrating Stock Doves and after work we did duck-counts. The best bird was a Mute Swan that Hanna found from the bird-tower.

On Friday the 16th of October I saw a young Golden Eagle migrating over Kangaskylä. I called Hanna and she managed to see the bird from our garden. After work we packed our car and soon were driving towards South. We were going to spend our autumn-holiday in Jurmo island.

J.A.