Ringmærkningen: The Common redstart (Rødstjert) had already started singing when we began opening the nets this morning, and the first bird we caught was a female of this species. Perhaps she was flying to see who was singing like that? The first round was rather calm with seven birds of seven different species, which was pretty good ! Regarding what was singing in the garden, it was full of promise! A Common grasshopper warbler (Græshoppesanger) was singing loudly just close to a net. It's not a rare bird, but it's not that common in the garden here in Gedser. We also heard several Lesser whitethroats (Gærdesanger) and one Wood warbler (Skovsanger). The next rounds were rather calm. At 7:20am, we were waiting for the next one in front of the house, watching what was happening around the high net. Suddenly, Mathilde saw a small bird caught high in the net: white belly, yellow throat and yellow eyebrows, a green back, the first Wood warbler of the season, finally ! What a wonderful bird, my friends ! There was also the third Black redstart (Husrødstjert) of the season in the same net, so Mathilde and Olga learned how to identify the Common and Black redstarts by looking at the primaries.

My favourite Phylloscopus ! Skovsanger. Foto : Théophile Fontaine

We ended up with 42 birds from 15 species, which is a good number and the first time this has been reached this year. This number should increase in the coming weeks — I'm looking forward to finding out when ! Not tomorrow, but maybe on Sunday ?

A view of the nice species we had this morning. Foto : Théophile Fontaine

Trækket på Odden: Another beautiful and sunny morning at the tip today, but once again the birds didn’t really turn up. Our team of four (or five ?) people eventually spotted 586 individuals of 33 different species, so we can say it was a slow morning. But with such weather, even a quiet morning can’t bring the mood down, only the warm layers !

Ont he other hand, the mosquitos were as ready as yesterday to fill up the air, much to the delight of the passerines who now can spend their day moucheronning (our own English translation of the word “moucheronner” which, in French, refers to the behavior of some passerines when they do really short flights to catch some insects before going back to their perching spot). Every day we hear a new species in the bushes, coming to enjoy the feast.

One of today's adventurer, aiming for Germany ! Or almost... Black kite (Sort Glente), Picture by Louis A Hansen.

For the people who left the spot to see the Wood Warbler at the station, the highlight of the day might be the two Black Kites (Sort glente) who came really close to the spot and seemed to aim for Germany, before coming back 15 minutes later… Hopefully they will eventually find their route ! But while almost everybody was at the station, a Hobby (Lærkefalk) tried to sneak out and migrate North without anyone knowing. Little did he know that Louis was ready, and wouldn’t miss that kind of movement, especially on such a quiet day!

Se alle dagens observationer ved Gedser Odde i DOFbasen.

Afternoon : In French, we use to say that when the warm days are coming, we have to do the 'Grand ménage de printemps', which literally means 'big spring cleaning'. That's what happened this afternoon — we cleaned and polished the house in preparation for the open house on Sunday ! Pictures as proof !

Folk på stationen: Cyann Ménard, Mathilde Sif Eiby, Sjoerd van Baal, Théophile Fontaine, Olga Fernandez Enriquez, Mads Elley, Louis A Hansen