Butterflies and buntings

In the end of June and the beginning of July it was very quiet in bird life. All birds were breeding and hiding. The best observations we made were butterflies as we saw plenty of Poplar Admirals, Purple Emperors and Lesser Purple Emperors and some Yellow-legged Tortoiseshells and finally our first ever White Admirals. We also saw a couple of very interesting clytie-form of Lesser Purple Emperors


There weren’t many birds to see. On the 1st of July in Siikalahti I saw a Gadwall and a Common Redshank and then we found a nest of a Lesser Spotted woodpecker. In Kangaskylä I saw an Oystercatcher with the youngsters so they were still alive.

On the 5th of July I saw 3 adult Oystercatchers and in Siikalahti I saw the first Great Egret of the year. In the afternoon we visited Saari Pohjanranta where we saw a Grey Heron, 2 Whimbrels, 6 Ruffs, 2 Temminck’s Stints, a Common Redshank and a Stock Dove. On the way back home we saw 12 Lesser Black-backed Gulls and a couple of Stock Doves in Särkisalmi.

On the 6th day we had SSP-ringing again and we were expecting to get more birds but it was one more disappointment again. We caught a Robin, 2+2c Sedge Warblers, 3+1c Common Whitethroats, 2+1c Willoe Warblers, 3 Pied Flycatchers, a Yellowhammer and 1+1 Reed Buntings. Meanwhile our friend Kalle Hiekkanen had a bit better SSP-ringing session in Siikajoki where he caught the first ever Yellow-browed Bunting for Finland and the second ever Pallas’s Reed Bunting in an hour! So our weekend-plans were clear. Hanna stayed the last rounds on empty mist-nets while went pack everything ready. When I came back we did the last round and of course then we caught most of our birds. But after all we managed to get mist-nets off in time and still went to pack last things, ate a little and soon started a long drive towards Siikajoki.

It was a long and tiresome drive as I had been watching football at too many nights. We stopped only to fill up the tank and in the afternoon we finally parked to Tauvo. Then we had a couple of kilometers walk to Kalle’s SSP-site. There we found plenty of twitchers who had arrived all around the country, but they hadn’t seen anything yet.

In the evening we saw a flock of 3 Dunlins migrating and from the bushes we found just a Crested Tit, a couple of Blackcaps and one extremely skulky bunting which was giving a couple of “tic” calls but was seen only too briefly and mostly in flight. But it could have been a Yellow-browed Bunting. All reed buntings we found were just Common Reed Buntings.

We slept on hammocks next to the bunting place and continued the search early in the morning. We couldn’t find the ticking bird at all but both male and female and also young Common Reed Buntings were found – and they were all extremely skulky. While searching we saw a flock of 4 migrating Common Shelducks, a Northern Pintail, a Whimbrel, a Caspian Tern, 122 Common Crossbills and some passerines that were hiding on the bushes which 2 Blackcaps were mostly making false alerts.

Some twitchers had brief views to one promising-looking reed bunting a couple of times and finally with a couple of friends we also managed to see it flying a couple of times on the reeds. It was seen only briefly flying towards the spit and we managed to see that it looked quite contrastic and small. We followed it and checked all the bushes until the last ones but it had disappeared. I was the only one to continue until the rocky spit and of course I flushed it from there! I saw it quite well and it really looked small too! But of course I couldn’t see grey small-coverts and it didn’t call. So I shouted to other birders who were next to the bushes that the bird was flying towards them but when they heard me shouting they started to run! So they didn’t see the bird passing them flying over the reeds very close by.

Of course we went after the bird but found again only Common Reed Buntings. I thought that my bird had flew a little bit more along the shore but people started to be too tired and the weather was also getting much worse. So soon everyone else left before the rain was coming. We went to sleep to our hammocks and slept for several hours while it was heavily raining.

When we woke up it was very bad wind and the next rain was soon approaching. So we decided to give up too and walked to our car.

As we had been sleeping well we decided to drive to Luoto where the Bonelli’s Warbler had still been singing and calling in Eugmo Fränsviken. We were finally there about at 5 p.m. and a couple of hours earlier our friend had still heard it singing shortly. The bird had been some hundreds of meters in different place than where I had got it in the change of May and June. We were searching for it for some time until Hanna finally heard it singing once quite far inside the forest. We walked about 100 meters into the woods and soon found it singing again. Then we also managed to see it briefly moving on the trees with a couple of Willow Warblers. It had been ringed since my last visit. But at least Hanna had got a Finnish-tick.

On the way we still stopped in Evijärvi Särkijärvi again where we saw 8 Black Terns but they were all the time very far so we couldn’t get any pictures. We also saw a Grey Heron, a Hobby and a Marsh Harrier there before we started a long drive back home.

In Juva we still saw a Ural Owl, in Savonlinna Kerimäki a big owl that probably was an Eagle Owl and then in Särkisalmi a Short-eared Owl, We were finally at home at 2 a.m. and I was having a normal week.

On the 8th of July I visited Siikalahti where I saw again a Common Redshank and in the evening we visited the main tower and we saw 5 Gadwalls, a Smew, 3 Great Egrets and a couple of Stock Doves. On the 9th day I saw at least 2 Black Kites and a White-tailed Eagle and quite a few other raptors and on the 11th day again a Black Kite and a White-tailed Eagle. During the week Hanna was having our car as she was making atlas and photographing trips.

On the 12th of July I had managed to sleep enough to do some birding so we headed to Saari at 2 .m. to search Lanceolated Warblers or something else better. We checked all the best places but all the fields had been cut and we found only some Corn Crakes, 2 Blyth’s Reed Warblers and a Grasshopper Warbler. We also saw a Short-eared Owl, a Grey Heron and a couple of Whimbrels. In Pohjanranta we saw a young Common Redshank. We ended the trip in Siikalahti where we saw an adult and a young Great Grey Shrike and I saw a Grey-headed Woodpecker.

I had to go to work at 7:30 a.m. but I was back in Siikalahti on my lunch-hour and I managed to see a migrating flock of about 30 Bar-tailed Godwits and one Knot. I also saw 3 Gadwalls, a Pintail and 3 Great Egrets before I had to go to finish my work-day.

In the morning there were again news from Siikajoki where Teo Ylätalo and Antti Vänskä had been birding together with Kalle Hiekkanien on Kalle’s SSP-site. After a long search they had managed to see and hear the Pallas’s Reed Bunting and there were some rumours about a ticking bunting too. So after my work we packed our car again and were soon driving to Siikajoki again.

We were in Siikajoki at 9 p.m. and I had probably got speeding-ticket on the way. There had been no sightings of any rare buntings so the place had been no protected as Kalle was going to have his SSP-ringing next morning.

We weren’t too tired yet so we waited for Hanna’s sister Elissa for an hour and then headed to Tauvo Ulkonokka. There we walked quite a lot before we found any birds, but for us inlanders it was good to see Common Shelducks, an Arctic Skua, Caspian Terns, even 10 Little Terns, 40 Dunlins, 4 Curlew Sandpipers and 2 Little Stints. Then we put up a camp close to Tauvo-road and started sleeping.

On the 13th of July we met with other twitchers at 3 a.m. and soon walked to a place to the shore where we had visibility to the bunting-bushes but we were far enough from the ringing site so we wouldn’t disturb the ringing-session. If Kalle was going to catch anything rare he was of course coming to show it to us.

While discussing with many friends I was mainly seawatching and I saw a Long-tailed Duck, 3 Black and 4 Red-throated Divers, a Honey Buzzards that came from the sea, 9 Razorbills, an Arctic Skua, Whimbrels, Dunlins, a Temminck’s Stint, a Ruddy Turnstone, a couple of Caspian Terns and so on. After a long waiting some birders that were standing on the shore closest to the bushes first heard some promising calls and then saw a reed bunting species on the top of one willow and it looked promising. I was behind them and I couldn’t see the bird until it was flying on the sky and disappeared again. Unfortunately nobody had managed to get any pictures and it seemed that it hadn’t been seen well enough for ticks.

The shore was fully crowded so I walked to the sea where I got good visibility to all the willow-tops. Then we again just waited something to happen. Kalle’s 4-hours ringing session was soon over but we soon heard that some promising ticking calls had been heard on the ringing site. So we were still hopeful and decided to stay still on the same place.


I felt that my wellington was leaking but after a long wait Jani Vastamäki saw a bunting with his scope just accidently walking on the ground. He started to tell the identification marks and it was soon clear that he was watching the Pallas’s Reed Bunting. I was very close to him but there must have been some plant or rock between me and the bird so I couldn’t find it. I moved one meter and then saw the bird with my binoculars but of course it then flushed and flew behind the bushes again. And still most of the twitchers hadn’t seen the bird at all.

So we kept on waiting but luckily pretty soon a reed bunting was seen flying to the bush closest to the tip. So everyone took good positions and a small group led by Sami Tuomela with his thermal camera started approaching the bush. Sami was about 3 meters from the bush when the bunting flushed and flew quite a long way to the bushes but this time at least a couple of photographers managed to get pictures of it and it was clearly a Pallas’s Reed Bunting! And I must say that I had seen the bird as well as on the previous Sunday – expect then nobody got pictures.

So it was time to start searching for the ticking bunting. This bird had proved to be even more difficult to see so we just went in the middle of the bushes to wait for it to show up.

We were waiting and waiting and a couple of some birders with good hearing and good positioning managed to hear some tick-calls and a couple of times some saw a bunting very briefly. I also managed to see it once on the top of pine and once in flight. All identification-marks that were seen were good for a Yellow-browed Bunting but still nobody saw it well – for example nobody saw the yellow eyebrowe.

During the day we slept a couple of hours and then came back to search. But the evening was very quiet until quite late we heard some tick-calls again but again we saw nothing.
When twitchers decided to give up I went to get my recording-stuff from our car while Hanna put up a camp close to the site again.

On the 14th of July we slept until 4 a.m. and then soon found other twitchers who had already managed to see the Pallas’s Reed Bunting. But then it had flight at least 500 meters to the other side of Kaasa-lighthouse.

So we could start searching the ticking bird again. And we didn’t have to wait for too long before we heard ticking. I started to sound-record it but of course some impatient twitchers started to move. I even managed to see the bird with my thermal camera and I was just about to get my camera and take pictures from the bush where I knew the bird was when someone walked right in front of me! I leaned a little to see the bush but then I saw the bird flying towards the sky and soon it disappeared behind the trees.

But at least now we had managed to get some recordings of this bird and the calls were analyzed very soon and the sonograph looked very promising for Yellow-browed Bunting – they were clearly different than Rustic or Little Bunting calls.

We stayed on the place until mid-day but no buntings were seen or heard. Other birds we had observed had been Bramblings and Common Redpolls and so on. We still decided to visit Ulkonokka again. Water was very low now so there were lots of sand-beaches now. But there were almost no birds at all. We saw only the same Common Shelducks, Caspian Terns and one young Little Tern and a Bar-tailed Godwit. Finally we walked back to our car and started a long drive back to home. We stopped to eat with Elissa on Pulkkila ABC but then we continued driving. In Iisalmi we saw a Pheasant and then we still visited Savonlinna Kerimäki Tänkky as a possible Black-winged Pratincole had seen flying over a field nearby. But we saw only a couple of Ruffs and Wood Sandpipers.

We were finally at home at 8 p.m. and I managed to sleep for 2 hours before I had to wake up to watch the football Euro final. Luckily the best team, Spain, won.

In the beginning of the week there weren’t any interesting bird in Siikalahti or Saari Pohjanranta. We still saw quite a few butterflies and now Silver-washed Fritillaries, Map Butterflies, Wood Whites and some other species were flying. We still saw one Lesser Purple Emperor too and some friends had still seen several White Admirals.

J.A.