Naerland Nord

Having seen the big numbers when the day was wet, cold and windy the week before: I couldn't wait to see what it's like on  a relatively good weather day. I rushed back to Naerland very early Saturday morning to check out my favorite birds.

Originally I thought of doing a timelapse of waders feeding and flying off, as it turned out the wader numbers weren't too significant and they were spread out, not to mention that the remote unit didn't reach as far as I thought. That idea was quickly abandoned.

I left most of the gear in the car and decided to explore Naerland Nord, a short northerly walk away. This was the upper section of the beach ... rocky and full of rotting kelp. And full of birds  ... ducks, seagulls, waders, all of them are there! Armed now with only the 400/5.6 and half of a battery life, I decided to stay. I edged closer and closer towards the shore and towards the birds.

It was exhilarating (in addition to the sweet acrid smell of decomposing kelp) to be amidst this order within chaos. Waders all over the place : Bar-tailed Godwit, Sanderling, Little Stint, Ruddy Turnstone, Red Knot, Redshank, Dunlin, Eurasian Curlew, Oystercatcher, Common Ringed Plover, as well as Grey Plover. There are ducks Common Eider and Mallards; seagulls, cormorants and starling. Every half and hour a Peregrine Falcon swooped by onto the buffet  ... and thousands of winged wonders took up to the skies, swirling and circling towards the sea and landed back onto the kelp buffet table in a few minutes.

Last year I spent many and outing searching for THE wader spots in Jaeren, looks like this year I can vouch for two ... Naerland and Reve. Wondering now how the numbers are at Madland, Obrestad, and Kvassheim these last few days! 

Finally it's a case of too little time, too many waders!

PS: Reminder to self - lug all gear all over the place!

Words and images by Nazeri Abghani/07Sep2013