more Helgoland

Olive-backed Pipit, Ostklippe

More impression from last weekend, with nice weather, many birds and many birders. I dipped the Dipper and the day after I returned home there were Alpine Swift and Desert Wheatear. I might have a retry for the latter soon:-)

only a few Snow Buntings were seen, probably due to the warm weather

there were still many Northern Wheatears on the island

eastern Lesser Whitethroat @Nordseehalle

same bird showing tail and wing

this Blätterkönig found one of the few pine trees on the island

Belegfoto of Pomarine Skua, a good one on the birdrace

the Pectoral Sandpiper on Dune, only the fifth record on Helgoland

a superb Olive-backed Pipit gave a great show on Ostklippe

Blätterkönig again

Goldcrest

the same bird

Skylark

"arctic"-looking Willow Warbler

Yellowhammer @Sudhafengelande

Reed Bunting NOGelande

eastern Lesser Whitetroat @Unterland, photographed from my window

this "pale-legged" leaf-warbler caused come confusion @Bunte Kuh

Jack Snipe landing in not so typical habitat

large flock of Brambling and Chaffinch @Kringel

Shore Lark Dune

the Paddyfield-Booted-Garden Warbler @Kringel :-)

Blätterkönig again!

birdrace

PecSand twitch

Helgoland - Ortolan mystery solved

Today was great, with mass arrival of Redwing and Songtrush, and many Goldcrest, finches and others. The bird of the day could have been an "ortolan", which was seen briefly at Nordstrand and later Sudhafengelande. The bird went missing during the rainy afternoon but just before darkness the weather improved and I made a last round on SHG. And there I flushed the ortolan, just a few meters in front of me! Pictures below are taken in last light (3200ISO, sorry for the quality), but they show that this bird must be indeed an Ortolan Bunting, a really late one. It should have been a much rarer bunting:-)

Unfortunately I was not able to solve my own mystery-warbler. This YB below looked rather pale in the field and shows a restricted upper wingbar, but I had only brief views. The bird did not reappear (Unterland).

Goldcrest - more pictures of this and others later!

Helgolander Vogeltage 2014

I believe it was appreciated that I tried to speak German in my pelagic-birding presentation, and I never came this close to winning the 1000+ euro Zeiss binoculairs in the mystery-bird competition (second...). There have been many good birds last days with Pectoral Sandpiper, Olive-backed Pipit, Little Buntings, eastern Lesser Whitethroat, Red-breasted Flycathers, Puffin and of course Yellow-browed Warblers!

Blätterkönig

More later, it looks promising for coming days and at the moment the nocturnal sky is full with calls of migrating Song Trushes, finally some riesen migration!

Yellow-browed Warbler and Helgoland

Succeeded today in what seemed impossible last weekend on Helgoland; a decent record-shot of a Yellow-browed Warbler. This one favoured a small garden in a village in Groningen.

Last weekend we found several Yellow-broweds and a Red-breasted Flycatcher on Helgoland but all were real skulkers. In contrast, the waders on Dune were very tame and approached to within a few meters.

Dunlin

Sanderling

Ringed Plover

Dunlins

and with a Sanderling

Dunlin

Dunlin

And some more images from Helgoland, other records included 2 MedGulls, Firecrest, Merlin, Arctic Skuas and Black Guillemots.

Sparrowhawk hunting along Kringel

Stonechat showing tail, for sure not a casp

best view of YB

exciting numbers of wagtails, pipits and wheatears at Kringel, all feeding on kelp-flies

Meadow Pipit

migrating Richard's Pipit at an area we used to know as Sudhafengelande