Winterbird count and leap day birding
On the 25th of February we were skiing around Siikalahti with Hanna. The weather was nice but there were almost no birds at all – only 3 Black Grouses and a Great Grey Shrike were birds to mention. When we were back at home I realized that the next day was the only possible day that I could do a winterbird count. It meant that I had to ski 17 kilometres and the weather forecast wasn’t promising at all.
On the 26th of February I woke up early and already before 8 a.m. I was walking in Kangaskylä and counting the few birds I could find. The wind was blowing pretty hard and it was snowing so that was maybe part of the reason why there were so few birds but the main reason is that there are not enough feeders in the village. Only one bigger flock of tits were found before I crossed the main road 6 and started skiing towards Siikalahti. A flock of 12 Bullfinches were seen and a Crested Tit was heard before I was on the dam-road. On one farm there were Magpies, Jackdaws, Hooded Crows, Tree Sparrows and Yellowhammers, but then the next 7 kilometres were same that I had been skiing on the previous day so I took it as sport more than bird-count. Only a Black Grouse, a Jay, a couple of tits and a nice flock of 6 Siskins were found.
After a couple of kilometres in deep snow I finally I crossed the main road 6 again but there were less birds than ever in the village!
The final numbers were: Black Grouse 1, Rock Dove 8, Great Spotted Woodpecker 3, Willow Tit 7, Crested Tit 1, Blue Tit 10, Great Tit 45, Jay 4, Magpie 17, Jackdaw 87, Hooded Crow 16, Raven 2, House Sparrow 4, Tree Sparrow 10, siskin 7, Bullfinch 12 and Yellowhammer 30.
On the leap day I was working but because of this 29th of February is only on every 4th year I had to try to get sopme leap day ticks! So before the work I twitched a flock of 21 Goldfinches in Kangaskylä and a Nuthatch in Likolampi. On my lunch-hour I went to see Siberian Jays to Melkoniemi and fouf the birds easily! Then after the work I still drove to Simpele River Kokkola where I first saw a Dipper and a couple of Golden eyes (which werent leap day ticks) and after some searching found a Little Grebe too which was my leap day tick number 44. 4 years earlier I had seen all the other 40 species on my tour around South Karelia.
J.A.