SUMMER 2008 FELL ON A SUNDAY IN
TROMSØ, N. NORWAY
Yesterday was sunny, calm and by our standards warm, the temp. increasing to
22.1*C in the course of the day. As you know, we had had only one hour of
summer weather (>20*C) previously in 2008, no wonder then that 'everybody'
was out in the field yesterday: I have never ever seen so many cars on
Kvaløya, occupying every possible picnic spot along the shore or in the
mountains. This is our last weekend with midnight sun, so it was time summer
finally arrived! Sadly, though, it will be gone again this afternoon, when
we start on a new period of rainy cool days. I have often heard people say
up here, that 'if you oversleep one day, you may have missed the summer';
that is certainly exaggerated, but there is nevertheless a kernel of truth
there!
I had already on Saturday planned an extensive walk on the island of
Tromsøya, starting from my home, but after an hour or so I had to give up
that plan because of pouring rain, for which I definitely was not clad,
stupidly enough. Just then I walked in the area called 'Bak-Olsen' (Behind
Olsen's property), a very hilly area, where there used to be farms and
grazing grounds and where parts are still kept open, as the area is very
popular as a skiing, slalom and ski-jumping place for kids in winter. Now
the meadows, nowadays only grazed by horses, were a riot of colour, the
dominant violet of the carpet of cranebills Geranium nicely punctuated by
the buttery yellow of buttercups and Trollius. Lots of orchids (Dactylorchis
fuchsii) also here, and I fould a rare completely white one among the
hundreds of violet orchid flowers. Along the roads finally the enormous
flowers of the 'Tromsø palms' the giant Heracleum, have appeared. In mails
in earlier years I have several times noted these in flower in late June;
this year they are at least three weeks later and in my opinion maybe also
slightly less tall, with few plants over 3m. Still, where they grow (and
they are very common in Tromsø), they dominate the scene and crowd out all
other plants. As they moreover are slightly poisonous (the juice, in
combination with sunlight, can cause serious bladders and other skin
irritations), and as they do not belong here anyway (they come from the
Altai mountains in Central Asia), there is now a official campaign to
eradicate them. I fear that that will be much easier decided than actually
done! Of birds there are few conspicuous ones here this time a year; most
often one hears the dry rattles of small groups of Redpolls, or the harsh
scolding of the Fieldfares.
But on the Sunday the weather was, as said, everything we could wish for,
and I embarked on my customary roundtrip on the island of Kvaløya, between
us and the sea, a trip of c 130km. I started out at the airport, still on
the island, where I found most shorebirds apparently finished with their
breeding chores: on the sandy beach where two weeks ago there were very many
Ringed Plovers, Oystercatchers and Turnstones alarming, there were now only
two pairs of Ringed Plovers left, while one could see the young
Oystercatchers with their parents far down into the intertidal (We have c 4m
tidal amplitude here) The only shorebirds still definitely anxious were the
Redshanks, whereever I walked here I was surrounded by the pitifully crying
parent birds, the young where I saw them, were already quite large and will
be soon able to fly, I guess. The Sedge Warblers had stopped singing, and
the Starling boxes were now empty; only the Meadow Pipits still flew around
anxiously, with beak-fulls of insects. Also here lots of flowers, and a
clear 'changing of the guards', summer flowers as harebells Campanula, hedge
bedstraw Galium mollugo , common vetch Vicia cracca and meadow vetchling
Lathyrus pratensis have taken over much of the road verges, while the two
Melampyrum species, common and small cowwheat, flower everywhere where there
are trees or bushes. The air is full of the 'snow' of plumed willow seeds,
eagerly pursued here at the airport by bands of young Greenfinches.
My first stops on Kvaløya were on Kattfjordeidet, the only area during this
roundtrip, where the road climbs to > 200m and thus almost to the tree line.
I did two walks there through the marshy heath, followed everywhere by pesky
flies. The vegetation here is heath-like, with Dwarf Birch, Crowberries,
Heather, Bog Andromeda, Cranberries and Bearberries Arctostaphylos spp.. The
only flowers here were those of the Bog Andromeda, but in the wetter areas
there are also here orchids Dactylorchis, butterwort Pinguicula vulgaris,
Cotton grass and the minuscule flowers of Tofieldia pusilla. hardly any
birds at all: on these two walks I met one alarming Wheatear, and a family
of Fieldfares.
So onwards to Hillesøy, near the open sea, and there of course there are
always birds galore, at least in numbers. In fact, I ad to modify my route,
as a thriving colony of maybe 2-300 pairs of Arctic Terns, now probably with
small young, would make it highly hazardous to follow the normal route, even
the outlying pairs caused me enough trouble already, together with the
Common Gulls---now with half-grown young--, and the Arctic Skuas, whose
territories I avoided as best I could. The peaty heath here had some more
flowers: lots of vetch and birdsfoot trefoil Lotus corniculatus, and more
bautiful white orchids Leucorchis graminea than I have ever seen here
before; one spot I found no less than 25 growing together. On the outer
coast 'the usual suspects'. Black Guillemots, Common Eiders and Shag
Phalacrocorax aristotelis, no sea eagles or ravens here today, though. And
not all that much evidence of the start of the autumn shorebird migration as
yet; at the airport there was a single Spotted Redshank Tringa erythropus,
and at my last traditional stop, the wetlands of Tisnes, I found a small
flock consisting of three Golden Plovers and two Barred Godwits; all these
may well be already on their way south. here I also had the good fortune to
find quite a number of the wonderfully 'true blue' flowers of the Snow
Gentian Gentiana nivalis, one of my absolute favourite flowers.
Many of the haylands have now been mowed, and the grass collected in the
white plastic 'tractor-eggs'; so much less picturesque than the 'hesjer',
the strings on which the hay was hung to dry until just a few years ago. So
much less picturesque, but also, so much less back-breaking work for the
farmers!
No reindeer today (last week I had a very close encounter with two at
Rakfjord), but a Harbour seal Phoca vitulina at Hillesøy, and a Stoat
Mustela erminea on the road, in front of the car. I add the bird list, just
to show that pickings are comparatively meagre this time a u\year
Summer was well worth waiting for! Pity only it went so fast!
Wim
Vader, Tromsø Museum
9037
Tromsø, Norway
Bird list Kvaløya 20 july 2008
Cormorant Phalacrocorax carbo
Shag Ph. aristotelis
Grey Heron Ardea cinerea
Mallard Anas platyrhynchos
Wigeon A. penelope (with young)
Northern Eider Somateria mollissima (with young)
Red-breasted Merganser Mergus serrator
Willow Grouse Lagopus lagopus (excrements only)
Oystercatcher Maematopus ostralegus (with young)
Ringed Plover Charadrius hiaticula (with young)
Golden Plover Pluvialis apricaria
Curlew Numenius arquata
Whimbrel N. phaeopus (with young)
Bar-tailed Godwit Limosa lapponica
Redshank Tringa totanus (with young)
Spotted Redshank T. erythropus
Ruff Philomachus pugnax
Arctic Skua Stercorarius parasiticus
Great Black-backed Gull Larus marinus
Herring Gull L. argentatus
Common Gull L. canus (with young)
Arctic Tern Sterna paradisaea (with young)
Black Guillemot Cepphus grylle
Sand Martin Riparia riparia
Barn Swallow Hirundo rustica (one, at farm on Tisnes)
Meadow Pipit Anthus pratensis
White Wagtail Motacilla alba
Common Starling Sturnus vulgaris (large flocks of young birds on
Hillesøy)
Magpie Pica pica
Hooded Crow Corvus cornix
Sedge Warbler Acrocephalus schoenobaenus
Willow Warbler Phylloscopus trochilus
Northern Wheatear Oenanthe oenanthe
Redwing Turdus iliacus
Fieldfare T. pilaris
Brambling Fringilla montifringilla
Greenfinch Chloris chloris
Redpoll Acanthis flammea
==============================www.birding-aus.org
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