Ringmærkningen: Der var småregn til morgen, men det stoppede dog ved omkring 8.30.

Jeg tænkte at sætte nettene op, men da flere net var blevet noget slappe efter sneen er begyndt at smelte fik vi ordnet alle de opsatte net på nær 2 hvor pløkkerne var frosset fast.

I morgen loves tørvejr, så hvis tågen ikke er for våd sætter jeg nogle net op og håber der kan komme lidt i.

Da den standariserede ringmærkning begynder 1 marts fodrer vi ikke mere da det ellers vil kunne komme til at påvirke fangsten.

The other day we showed a picture of our new colleague, Cyann; now she has written a presentation about herself and her impressions of her first days at the station:

Hi, I am Cyann, from France! I am 23 and I come from Rennes, in Bretagne, where I did my studies in Biology and Ecology. I am currently in the final year of my master degree, for which I am asked to do a 6 months internship before I graduate. For this internship I wanted to work abroad on bird migration, so that is why I asked to join Gedser Fuglestation’s team. In addition to participating in the migration monitoring throughout spring, and getting an insight on bird ringing at the station, I will conduct a study on the impact of weather and climate conditions at breeding or wintering grounds on the timing of bird migration. I should stay all spring and summer at the station to do so, so I will have plenty of time to discover all the new birds I rarely see in France and to learn from all the people I will meet here.

Before arriving, I braced myself for the early wakes-up and the cold weather. But it is not as bad as I expected, as waking up early in the morning to count migrating birds is something I am already used to, and I am already getting used to the cold weather. The life rhythm here is simple and really easy to catch-on, so I have a great feeling for the upcoming months.

Sun is finally appearing behind the clouds. Picture by Cyann Ménard.

Trækket på Odden: Today was the first day since the beginning of spring migration monitoring that we started the day without rain. Without the rain, the cold temperature was much more bearable than the two previous days, and we even saw a bit of the sun rising through the clouds.

Today was also the first day we started having a sense of spring migration, as there were a lot more movements towards the North-East than the previous days. Almost as many Eiders (Somateria mollissima) went northwards than southwards, and large flocks of Barnacle Geese (Branta leucopsis) were flying above our heads, either going back inland or definitively leaving northwards. The passerines, such as Skylarks (Alauda arvensis), Starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) and some Fieldfares (Turdus pilaris), are also starting to fly above Gedser Odde. In total, we observed 1671 individuals from 28 species, most of them were then seen for the first time of the season. It felt really great to see such diversity, and all the small groups passing by kept us entertained all morning. We hope these dynamics will continue the following days !

Some Scaups (Aythya marila) passing over Eiders in the water. The females have a lot of white around the beak. Photo: Ole Friis Larsen/GFU

Se alle dagens observationer ved Gedser Odde i DOFbasen.

Folk på stationen: Cyann Ménard, Sjoerd van Baal, Henrik Jørgensen, Ole Friis Larsen