Off to Jaeren again

With the encouraging number of waders and other birds seen last weekend, I thought it'd be a great idea to lug the big gear to the beach to see if an improved image can be made of several of the species seen then. I left the house at approximately 0545hrs and was in Revtangen by 0615hrs, even the cows were still chewing their cud waiting for sunrise.

A very nice landscape emerged as the sunlight slowly crept across the coast.

The boulders here seemed teeming with birds on previous visits, this weekend I was only accompanied by a Common Eider, several seagulls and passing cormorants.

It's low tide day which I wasn't expecting. It has been said that watching waders is best during high tides when they have less space to spread around; they also have the tendency to roost or rest when tide is highest, best times to find the highest concentration of waders for some places.

Both  the Southe and North beaches seemed much quieter than the previous week; the seagulls, crows and cormorants, common eiders were there. There weren't many waders except for a group of 10 Common Ring Plovers  encounter along the way to the North beach.

Once settled in between a big rock and a hard place, which was to be my station for the day, I unpacked and rigged up  the gear waiting for the waders. It was quiet. There were waves and waves of cormorants flying past in a southerly direction; seagulls squawking overhead and small little passerines moving northwards.

The elegant looking eclipsed male Common Eider which spent the morning foraging nearby completely not bothered with my presence.

Several small groups of Whimbrels flew past from the bluff probably from their roosting site somewhere along the Orrevatnet. More cormorants. Even the Dunlin were scarce. I sat there amusing myselft with some snails and admiring some very neat rocky beach landscape.

After close to two hours communing with the large boulders and devouring half a banana with only a few shots of an eclipse male Common Eider, my time was up. The waders were flying past without stopping; the ones that did stop were rather too few (probably two) which got lost amongst the boulders.

The cormorant which decided to land elsewhere. His brethren flew above the waves making their way south in big numbers (hundreds) that morning along the same beach.

The rounded rocks which scattered all over the beach, willing subjects.

This Ruddy Turnstone was the only one spotted on the way back to the car, it was kind enough to stop for 5 seconds and afford me the best shot of the day with the 600mm.

Nevermind, there's always next week. On the way back to the car I bumped into a willing Ruddy Turnstone which was kind enough to pose for a photo of the week!

Words and images by N. Abghani/NO-2012.