And now for something completely different. I left home yesterday and overnighted in Oslo before the flight to Svalbard this morning on the latest Bird's Wildlife & Nature tour.
The journey up here took us away from the carpet of green
pines, lush clearings and sparkling ponds, lakes and streams of southern Norway
and up over increasingly bleak and desolate Arctic Tundra landscapes before the
cloud shrouded us from the sea below.
Eventually a vast sweeping beach of stones and rugged snow
covered peaks told us that we had reached the southern tip of Svalbard and we
were only 12 minutes from landing. You
come in low alongside the coastal cloud shrouded hills before a firm landing.
Waiting for the luggage may have involved bins coming out
and the pools below us being scanned. Arctics and a single Great Skua patrolled,
Barnacle Geese were everywhere and Arctic Terns dipped up and down. Boarding the coach into town only gave us
a more comfortable view to look from and two drake King Eider were seen offshore
with Common Eiders while a male Long-tailed Duck was on the pools and Black
Guillemots whizzed along.
It was too early for us to check in to the hotel so baggage
was dumped and a leisurely walk out of town along the foreshore was taken. It was very cool and grey but thankfully dry. Snow Buntings were (and I think are…) the
only passerine and were singing and displaying from rooftops, nesting in
roosting Skidoos and pottering around in front of us collecting food. They are even more stunning in full plumage
and there is something about a black and white bird that actually makes then
look bigger than when they are cryptically shuffling around a sandy strandline.
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| Snow Bunting |
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| Snow Bunting |
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| Snow Bunting - they are wonderful in this plumage but it just feels all wrong! |
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| Snow Bunting |
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| Snow Bunting - Jim Willett |
Barnacle Geese and Eiders were the two commonest birds with
colonial nests of both species jammed between habitation and especially around
the Husky pens where little shelters had been made for them to give some protection
from the marauding adult Glaucous Gulls.
A single drake Wigeon was the only other duck down this end.
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| Barnacle Goose |
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| Barnacle Goose |
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| Barnacle Goose with a leucistic one - I wonder if it is one of the winterers from the Solway Firth? |
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| Every female Eider here is on a nest |
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| Eider |
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| Eider |
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| Eider |
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| Eider |
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| Eider |
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| Eider |
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| Eider |
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| Common (Northern) Eider - Some had very bright bills and even sails like this one. I think this makes them Somateria mollissima borealis? - Jim Willett |
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| Eurasian Wigeon |
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| Glaucous Gull |
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| Glaucous Gull |
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| Glaucous Gull |
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| Glaucous Gull |
Blue-ish Fulmars patrolled the cliffs inland and
occasionally headed back out to the bay where the tide was rapidly
falling. Purple Sandpipers were the
commonest wader but all were in their breeding finery of chestnut edged,
scalloped plumage. They look so different
but that tell tall shuffles gives them away at any distance. There were a couple
of pairs of small dark Tundra Ringed Plovers (they also seem to have less white
in the wing bar?) and the same of Dunlin but I am unsure what race they are.
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| Purple Sandpiper & Tundra Ringed Plover |
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| Purple Sandpiper |
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| Purple Sandpiper |
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| Purple Sandpiper - This one had a green flag C21 on the right leg and |
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| Orange above the joined metal below on the left. Having difficulty finding the scheme if anyone can help please? |
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| Dunlin |
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| Dunlin |
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| Dunlin |
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| White Arctic Mountain Heather - Cassiope tetragona |
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| White Arctic Mountain Heather - Cassiope tetragona |
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| Polar Willow - Salix polaris |
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| Polar Willow - Salix polaris |
Everything was so tame and that included the Arctic Terns
and a pair of Red-throated Divers that were building a nest on a grassy puddle
of an island in a small pool below the road.
They were completely un-phased by the rumble of passing trucks and the
few pedestrians but got very angry if any Barnacle Geese or Eiders got to
close. A power dive and sudden emergence
alongside them was enough to move them on.
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| Arctic Tern |
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| Arctic Terns |
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| Arctic Tern |
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| Red-throated Divers |
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| Red-throated Divers |
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| Red-throated Divers |
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| Red-throated Divers |
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| Red-throated Diver |
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| Red-throated Diver |
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| Red-throated Diver - when do you get the chance to just sit with birds as wonderful as this without causing any distress or disturbance? |
A male Svalbard Reindeer was found up on the closest slope and I tried to make every white blob across the bay into a Polar Bear but all were suspiciously huge, glowing Reindeer! Patience Howard!
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| Perhaps we shall look that way tomorrow? |
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| Please don't laugh at my emergency hat |
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| Svalbard Reindeer |
Back at the hotel my window gave me a view of the bay and a raft of 40 very dark Fulmars and Kittiwakes spent an age on the surface and I kept expecting a cetacean to appear but nothing every did. Snow Buntings sung from the rooftops opposite.
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| Snow Bunting |
Longyearbyen is like nowhere I have ever been to before. Rugged, desolate but still a modern, bustling community set amongst the remains of the coal mining industry. The bird palette may be limited but what we have seen so far shows very well indeed.
Tomorrow we board the MV Ortelius for the proper start of this Bird’s Wildlife & Nature adventure around the island. Fingers crossed for some very big furry and equally big blubbery mammals to go with the all the bird life. I will post when and where I can.
I do not think it will even get dark this evening, not that it got much above varying shades of grey today anyway so I must close the blackout curtains and get some sleep.
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