Blue Eyed Birder: Estonia for Oriole Birding

The crew were efficiently up and out front at 0650 so that we could get down to the tower at Puise before dawn. The weather had other ideas and a thick sea mist was rolling across the fields with a brisk breeze behind it. We still gave the tower a go but birds were not really moving although we did see (just about) a few more Tits and Goldcrests and one or two Brambling. Barnacle Geese drifted in and out of view but as the rain increased we opted to drive the local Haeska fields in search of ‘big game’ but Roe Deer were all we managed once again.

Looking for Elk

Barnacle Geese

Breakfast time and then we packed the vans and made our way east then south-west towards the port of Virtsu. A few bits and bobs were seen as we drove along but it was the Tuhu fields and bogs that gave us the birds with ten Black Grouse taking flight from several fields back. A couple circled back and one landed close enough to scope. They are such fast and powerful birds in flight.

A vocal Great Grey Shrike was giving a Kestrel some grief and three more were noted in the area along with four Common Buzzards. White-tailed Eagles put on a show as we drove down the old military runway-road.

White-tailed Eagle - how many Eagle encounters have I had this year?

As we neared the port a Kingfisher zipped across the front and a White-tailed Eagle lumbered overhead. On checking in I had flashbacks to February 2011 on our ‘interesting’ three day Baltic adventure. It was a challenging trip in many ways but I remember queuing in the dark, getting out of the +25c car and scurrying across to the waiting room and loos with the big port sign reading -27c. It was windy too and despite all the layers my eyeballs felt like they painfully froze in my head!

Virtsu February 2011

Virtsu 2025

Things were very different this time and as we pulled up in the sunshine a Northern Wheatear hopped up on a rock and on the pool behind there were snorkelling Goosanders with a few Mallard. The main bay held a raft of Scaup with a few Tufted Ducks and Great Crested Grebes.

Goosanders & a Northern Herring Gull

Northern Wheatear

With the vans loaded on board we had to walk past a tired female Great Tit that was also hitching a lift to Muhu while a Migrant Hawker was patrolling the car deck! There is no hanging around and we were soon under way. It is only a short crossing but we all stayed on the sun deck enjoyed great views of two flocks of mostly male Long-tailed Ducks barrelling south. Tarvo thought that they were the first proper movement of the season and indeed Spithami had a large count that morning.

Great Tit

Long-tailed Ducks

A single Common Scoter, four Red-throated Divers went the same way and a 2w Caspian Gull cruised by. Nearer the dock on Muhu there were Goosanders, Scaup and Tufted Ducks. Lunch in town where six Great Tits foraged under the vehicles in the car park perhaps suggested things to come. The last time I took this ferry ride the ship had to break its way through the ice and Goosander dropped in to feed in the briefly open waters and we even saw Roe Deer crossing over the ice.

Trip to Saaremaa - February 2011

The frozen Baltic - February 2011

Trip to Saaremaa - October 2025

The cloud had arrived at the wind picked up once again and we made a couple of stops on the causeway between Muhu and Saaremaa and scanned both sides. There were 73 Great Egrets dotted around and hundreds of Mute Swans and the Tufted Ducks, Goldeneye, Coots and dabblers were outnumbered but a vast flock of 3500 Pochard which Tarvo was especially pleased about. I think he said that it may have been the largest count in the country for ten years? Four female type Marsh Harriers quartered the vast reedbeds.

Great Egrets

Pochard and a few Tufties

Now on Saaremaa, we entered a landscape of pines and arable fields that I last saw 14 years ago covered in a thick blanket of snow. I seem to recall one Great Grey Shrike back then!

Saaremaa February 2011

This time we found a flock of at least 300 Common Cranes and managed to get quite close to where they were feeding. The sound as they took off was, as usual a very special experience and there were a few gasps of wonderment.

Common Cranes

As were first found the Cranes I had picked up a Red Kite which I knew to be a quality Estonian bird and once around the lanes with the Cranes we found what we presumed to be the same bird but the photos clearly show it to be a different bird. Tarvo was very pleased indeed. Flights of Tundra Bean and White-fronts drifted in and a flock of 14 Ravens tumbled with Hooded Crows along a woodland edge and a pale Buzzard got the pulses racing momentarily.

Tundra Bean Geese

Red Kite #1

Red Kite #2

The wind was seriously getting up as we neared Kaaressaare and the Asa Spa Hotel – our home for the next two nights. It looked tired outside but was very smart, modern and clean inside and we were very well looked after - for the first time ever clients used the spa facilities somewhere!. I dropped my bags and decided to stretch my legs across the road to the impressive fort and harbour lagoons. It was so windy that you could barely stand up and the flotillas of Coots were all jammed in a corner with some Tufted Ducks and Gadwall and a female Smew was actively feeding close in to the beach which was a cool addition. Thankfully Judith appeared and got to see it too and so it went on the group list that evening at the log!

Gadwall

Tufted Duck

Coots

Smew

A flock of 52 very miserable looking Great Egrets were hunkered along the reed edge and a gang of blue eyed, white collared Jackdaws were working the lawn and I wondered if they had been targeted by an avian predator and found feeding in a group a safer option. Ten Swallows were being blown around the hotel and were getting ready to find somewhere to roost for the night – as was I.