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Here’s his third stop: In June of 2013, we arrived in Helsinki, the capital and largest city in Finland, and our third destination on our European getaway. The spectacle, hosted by The Association of Samba Schools in Finland, includes over 1,000 dancers and musicians and draws a crowd of 20-30,000 with the goal of promoting Samba in Finland.
This Autumn/Winter has brought excellent numbers of another owl from its breeding grounds in Scandinavia and one that is a damn sight easier to see as it is partly diurnal or active during the day. Short-eared Owls do breed in Britain but every few years an ‘irruption’ of the like we are seeing occurs.
The Ural Owl inhabits old and undisturbed boreal forests, in an unbroken belt from Sweden and Finland across Russia to Japan, and is rarely seen to the south, only here and there, in the Carpathians (Slovakia/Ukraine/Romania/eastern Serbia) and Dinaric Alps (Croatia/Bosnia/western Serbia). Two years ago I screamed “UralOwlUralOwlUralOwl!!!”
The Willow Ptarmigan, which is the most numerous, can also be found in Russia, Finland, Scandinavia, and Canada. Unlike other grouse species, the male Willow Ptarmigan remains with the female throughout the breeding season to help raise the chicks. The Willow Ptarmigan was officially designated in 1960, when Alaska entered the union.
One year he was very excited when his female Hawaiian Goose hatched four healthy goslings, the first time he had managed to breed this species. My most memorable encounter with a non-wildfowl hybrid was some years ago in Finland, when I was taken to a Blackgrouse lek where two c**k Racklehahns were present.
You may recall that the hosts Sweden had some pedigree in this competition when Abba won with “Waterloo”, but their Scandinavian neighbours have been guilty of some dreadful entries including , the shame of Finland, Lordi and “Hard Rock Hallelujah”. Without the estimated 125 million viewers, he will sing through the night.
These globally threatened raptors breed from Ukraine eastward through Siberia and only a few come to overwinter here. One odd flock of Feral Pigeons above an arable field under deep snow – nothing for them to eat there, but I didn’t give them the attention they deserve and only a few hours later realised that they actually were Stock Doves.
Black-tailed godwits winter in large numbers on the estuaries of both Norfolk and Suffolk, and we know that nearly all these birds breed in Iceland. In breeding plumage islandica godwits develop a deeper red plumage than their limosa cousins. They are of the race islandica , a sub species of the nominate race, limosa.
Secondly, much of the appeal is that this is a bird we don’t see in the UK very often, for Waxwings are an irruptive species, and in most years only a few ever reach our shores from their breeding grounds in the boreal forests of Scandinavia. I’ve managed to see them, too, on their breeding grounds in Finland in summer.
Here in the Brecks – an area of poor, sandy soils on the borders of Norfolk and Suffolk – we have a small but important breeding population. They favour the old heaths, but a number of pairs also breed on farmland. Brettenham Heath National Nature Reserve holds the highest density of nesting Curlews in the Brecks.
I am not sure about the security situation in Iraq these days but at least some people do ornithological research there – resulting in papers such as one titled “Breeding observations of the Black-winged Kite Elanus caeruleus (Desfontaines , 1789) in Iraq” Impressive.
According to one paper , the Spotted Redshank is the German among the waders, at least in Finland: its arrival and departure on the breeding grounds are the most predictable. Surprisingly, they only stay on the breeding grounds for about 5 weeks. Then again, that is probably the length of summer in Finland.
Hopefully, the winter time in Shanghai gives the Black-faced Buntings some time to relax from the challenges of the breeding season. One Japanese study found that it arrives at its breeding grounds earlier than in the past, most likely due to increased spring temperatures. Maybe there is some justice in this world after all.
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