. . Lintuharrastajan päiväkirja Birders diary . .

Bird-tower competition

On the 7th of May we woke up before 4 a.m. and after a good breakfast we were in Siikalahti parking place at 4:40 a.m. Ilpo Kuusisalo was already there and soon we started to walk towards the bird-tower. It takes about 15 minutes with so much to carry so after all we had only 5 minutes to the beginning of the competition when we climbed to the tower. Hanna put some magazines and other stuff for visitors and soon also Matti Lötjönen, our 5th team-member arrived and then it was 5 a.m. and the race started. Our first species was a good one, 4 Smews were swimming in front of us. A lot of Black Grouses were lekking and Bitterns whooping. Other good birds in the beginning were a couple of Bullfinches, a flock of 60 local Barnacle Geese, 4 White-fronted Geese in a local flock of Bean Geese, a Merlin that was perched on a dead tree and a Canada Goose that was hiding on the back of the bay.
Of course we got plenty of common species in the beginning but some common migrants were maybe missed because of the group of photographers that climbed to the tower for the first couple of hours and they weren’t very silent – we heard almost nothing from the sky. Luckily Water Rails and a Whimbrel were calling aloud enough that we got them to our list.

Like always the most of the passerine migration was going too far from the tower and almost all the passerines we managed to identify were Chaffinches. Luckily we managed to see the first Bramblings and also Tree Sparrows from a feeder that was pretty far from the tower. And when the group of photographers left we managed to hear the only Tree Pipit of the day and also some Siskins and to see some Mistle Thrushes and Redwings and so on. Also a Green Sandpiper was got on its 2nd flight (2 of the team members have to see and identify a species). These birds are difficult every year in this competition! Also a couple of flocks of Waxwings were seen on their migration back to north like almost every bird-tower competition.
When the thrush and Chaffinch migration stopped there was almost nothing else migrating than Bean Geese. Surprisingly also a couple of bigger flocks of Barnacle Geese were seen and also 5 flock of Common Scoters – 300 birds altogether, 6 Velvet Scoters and a couple of bigger flocks of Black-throated Divers where were also 3 Red-throated Divers and an amazing huge Black-throated Diver with them.

The weather was very good and the trees behind the tower sheltered us from the weak northern wind. The visibility was great so we managed to identify Song Thrushes, a Dunnock and a House Sparrow very far and finally also a Yellowhammer.
Jay was much easier than normally this year when several birds were seen still migrating to different directions.
After 9 a.m. we had a bad hour and a half when we didn’t get any new species but finally a couple of Ruffs came to try to find a place where to land. And soon also a White-tailed Eagle and a male White-backed Woodpecker were seen.
It started to get very warm, but only other raptors were just local Marsh Harriers, Sparrowhawks, Ospreys, Common Buzzards and Kestrels.
A Cuckoo was calling shortly and a Spotted Redshank was migrating, only 4 Swallows were seen but 3 Sand Martins was a nice surprise, a Willow Warbler, a Pied Flycatcher, some Whinchats and our last species, a flock of 4 Linnets made our list up to 91 species which was our new record!
Of course we had expected to see also Pintails, Hen Harriers, Goshawks, Hobbies, Common Sandpipers, House Martins, Wheatears, Sedge Warblers and many other migrants and of course anything better too.
In the results we were once again the 2nd best tower inland ad 24th in whole country. Once again Tarassiinlahti was better, they had got 93 species.

After the bird-tower competition we slept for a couple of hours and went birding again. We checked a couple of places nearby but found only a nice Short-eared Owl in Lahdensuo. We decided to go to rest for a couple of more hours before a night-trip to Siikalahti and Kullinsuo, but there was something else coming that changed our plans…

J.A.