Raptors and owls
On the mornings I checked Lake Simpele from Härskiinmutka and saw (best daily number) 50 Tufted Ducks, 232 Long-tailed Ducks, 45 Common Scoters, 4 Velvet Scoters, 135 Common Terns and an Oystercatcher. In Kangaskylä I heard a Wryneck calling.
On the 10th of May I got a message that Esko Veijalainen was watching a Lesser Spotted Eagle in Siikalahti. I drove there and managed to see the bird disappearing behind the trees in east. While we were discussing about the eagle we noticed a Black Kite flying over us towards north-west. What a 5 minutes in Siikalahti!
In the afternoon we went to check the owl nest-boxes in Punkaharju, but there was nothing else than some marks that there has been an owl visiting the nest-boxes sometimes earlier. We also went to ring one of the new Ural Owl females and it was the biggest we’ve ever handled! It was also pretty angry and when we released it, it called very angrily and then also male started to call surprisingly close. On the way back I saw my first Hobby of the year.
After we had been in new sauna in Tarvaslampi we still went to see if one of our old Ural Owls really was the same than in previous years, but surprisingly it was already out from the nest-box! So we couldn’t check if it had the ring or not, but when I climbed to check that there really were nestlings in the nest-box, the female started to attack like in previous years! For sure it was the same bird! It’ll be very interesting to come back later to ring the nestlings!
On the 11th day there was a good geese migration, but I had to be at work. During my luch-hour I still saw about 1000 geese, mostly grey geese (Bean or White-fronted) but also some flocks of Barnacle Geese. Also one sub-adult White-tailed Eagle was seen.
In the evening we went to ring another new Ural Owl, which was much easier as it flew to the fish hand-net when we put it in front of the hole of the nest-box. This bird was also clearly smaller and weaker than the previous one.
On the 12th of May I visited Siikalahti on my lunch-hour. 30 Swallows and 30 House Martins, 70 Wood Sandpipers, 45 Ruffs, 7 Spotted Redshanks and a Temminck’s Stint were seen. I laso saw one more Black Kite. It seems they are again commoner than in many years in Siikalahti.
In the evening I had to go twitching again when I got a message that Markku Loippo had found a Steppe Eagle in Lemi Urola. On the way I picked up Sampsa again ans the rest of the trip was fast as Sampsa knew thr route to the place well.
When we were finally there in Urola we found the other twitchers and the bird was still on their scopes! The Steppe Eagle was perched on a pile of stumps about 1.5 km from us. But still it was easy to identify because of the colouration and its enormous bill. Hooded Crows were attacking towards it so it opened its wings a couple of timed and then it was even clearer to identify!
After some time the snu started to set down and then a Red Fox came to the same stumps. There was a couple of dead Whooper Swans on the field; they had flight towards the electric wires and thet was where the eagle had been found. Now the Fox was going to eat the swans too but it then noticed an eagle and I managed to get a video of these too animals metting each others!
J.A.