. . Lintuharrastajan päiväkirja Birders diary . .

On Friday on the 13th of September I got an idea to go to Siikajoki Tauvo. My brother was going there to a ringing station and I really had nothing better to do. So a couple of hours later after I had finished my work-day I started driving 520 kilometers to north-west.

It was a long drive but at 8 p.m. I finally turned to a small road towards Tauvo. I visited a harbour but I didn’t see anything there. So soon I turned to Tauvolantie. In Tauvola I saw a Hawk Owl perched on an electric pole and of course I took some pictures. Soon I was walking with my gear towards the station.

In the station I met Mikko Ojanen who had came there to ring and his wife Liisa and a Belgian birder Sander Buylants that had came to Oulu University 2 weeks earlier. He hadn’t seen a Hawk Owl in wild, they had just caught one early in the morning so we decided to try if the bird was still in Tauvola. We weren’t lucky so soon we were back in the station where a Tengmalm’s Owl tape was already playing.

We started to catch Tengmalm’s Owls soon and when Pirkka and his children arrived they could right away see some owls. We played the tape until midnight and managed to catch 7 Tengmalm’s Owls. Then it was time to go to sleep – we had an early wake coming.

On the 14th day we woke up after 6 and found still a couple of Tengmalm’s Owls from the mist-nets. Then we climbed to the bird-tower to watch the scenery to Ulkonokka. At 6:30 we started to check every single bird as on the same day there was a Surnia bird-race in Siikajoki. We had decided to participate only from Tauvo. Soon we had some common birds like Yellowhammer, thrushes, Robin, Redpoll etc. on our list. Then Sander found a Hawk Owl perched on the top pf a pine-tree but soon the bird dropped down and straight to a mist-net. I hurried to get it away from the mist-net and I checked immediately that it was not ringed as it was a relief to Sander that it wasn’t the same bird that they had caught less than 24 hours earlier. He had talked about a 24 hours rule about the trapped birds. But the bird was new so finally Sander had got a pure lifer.

While I had been freeing the owl Pirkka and Sander had seen a crossbill flock where had been at least one Two-barred Crossbill calling.

Soon Mikko and others went to do the first round to the mist-nets and there were mostly just Robins. I also joined to the next round and there were now some Reed Buntings, tits, a Chiffchaff and then a nice surprise – a Yellow-browed Warbler!

We stayed on the tower with Sander almost whole morning and saw a Merlin, 2 Black Grouses, a Black-throated Diver, 2 White-tailed Eagles, a Marsh Harrier, a Sparrowhawk, about 200 Cranes, 4 Black Woodpeckers, still some Swallows, a Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, a migrating Three-toed Woodpecker and heard a Hazel Hen calling. Jays were also on the move and we had an amazing flock of 78 Jays! Altogether we counted 98 Jays. at least 500 Fieldfares were seen and 45 Common, 5 Parrot, 5 Two-barred and 30 unidentified Crossbills.

Even the children were joining to the net-rounds and Veikka’s first round ever was great. He went of course first to the nets and we heard it even to the tower when he shouted that he had found a bird from the net – and he shouted that it was green! He had found the second Yellow-browed Warbler of the day!

When the fifth Black Woodpecker of the day was flying over the tower Mikko changed a Black Woodpecker tape to the player and soon we caught it! It’s amazingly powerful bird in hand!

At midday it started to get very quiet so we left to walk around Ulkonokka with Pirkka and Sander. It was very dry so I managed to survive with only walking boots. First we found only Ringed Plovers (altogether 33) but after a long walk we found also 25 Dunlins, 9 Sanderlings, 4 Little Stints, 3 Knots, 15 Ruffs, 17 Snipes, 10 Golden Plovers and a Grey Plover. Also a young Arctic Tern was seen.

After a sweaty hot round we relaxed a little bit but then climbed to the tower again. Mikko had changed a Redpoll tape to the player and caught 9 Redpolls and 2 young Arctic Redpolls. From the tower we saw a young Peregrine that tried to catch a young Black-headed Gull for more than 10 minutes but it didn’t manage. At 18:30 the bird-race ended and we counted that we had got 74 species.

In the evening we played first Pygmy Owl tape but soon changed Tengmalm’s Owl tape again. And before the midnight we had caught 13 more Tengmalm’s Owls.

On the 15th of September we woke up at 6:30 and soon climbed to the tower again. There were less birds now and the weather was also a little bit cooler. A Tengmalm’s Owl was found from the closest mist-net and the first round produced some thrushes. But later during the morning there were almost only Reed Buntings on the mist-nets. One of them was ringed in Italy! Only better mist-net birds during the morning were a Chiffchaff and a Lesser Whitethroat. We heard one Yellow-browed Warbler but didn’t manage to see it at all.

Pirkka was doing the ringing so we stayed in the tower together with Sander. The best birds we saw were 3 Mute Swans, a Three-toed Woodpecker, again all three crossbills and the best bird was a migrating Wood Lark which was maybe only the second ever in the station. Also 60 Jays were seen again.

At midday it was again very quiet so we packed most of our gear and then still decided to visit Ulkonokka very briefly. We walked to the place where most of the waders were and counted 20 Ringed Plovers, 40 Dunlins, 5 Sanderlings, 5 Little Stints, 12 Golden Plovers, 4 Grey Plovers and 4 Bar-tailed Godwits.

When we were back in the station Matti and Annikki Tynjälä had arrived. Matti was again going to stay there for a long period. Soon we had cleaned the building and packed everything and it was time to say goodbye to everyone. We walked to our cars where I said goodbye to Pirkka and his family and left towards Parikkala.

I was finally at home at 10:30 p.m. and I was absolutely tired. But anyway I had really had a great weekend – I had even got 3 new year-ticks!

J.A.