Tag Archives: Rødstrupe

Robin joined me for breakfast

No, not my son Robin (he arrives tomorrow).
Robins (rødstrupe) have over the years I’ve lived here changed from a shy forest bird to the tame inquisitive bird I was familiar with in the UK before movimg to Norway. This morning a young bird joined me at the breakfast table for a preen, stretch and scratch before resuming catching insects…



The Birds

Over the last couple of days there’ve been large numbers of birds in the garden making me think of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, although there have been fortunately no casualties as far as I know. I try to limit the amount of bird food I put out (as its production isn’t good for birds) and it’s good to see that most species are still eating natural food. 
This winter there’ve been reports from all over the county of unusual numbers of overwintering bramblings (bjørkefink) with flocks up to 300 birds recorded. I’ve had smaller flocks of 20-30 for some time, but yesterday they were everywhere in the garden and at least 140 birds were present, a new winter record for Malvik kommune! The films below show them both at the bird feeder, feeding on rowan berries (eating the seed and discarding the flesh) and also on the ground perhaps feeding on birch seed? 
Apart from that there was a sizeable flock of some 60 waxwings (sidensvans) on guelder rose / krossved (Viburnum opulus) and hawthorn (hagtorn) , 11 bullfinches (dompap), 50 house sparrows (gråspurv), 6 goldfinches (stillits) still mostly on burdock seed, 16 siskins (on birch seed), 6 greenfinches (grønnfink), 2 hawfinches (kjernebiter) seen on plum stones and rowan berries, a single robin (rødstrupe), a couple of fieldfares (gråtrost) on apples and hawthorn, a great spotted woodpecker (flaggspett) and great and blue tits both establishing territories now. In addition, a flock of 500-600 jackdaws (kaie) fly over to the roost every evening.

Bramblings with a hawfinch:

Bramblings with a hawfinch feeding on rowan seed (at the end, both birds are seen to discard the flesh). A greenfinch was also feeding on rowan.

Bramblings on the ground (feeding on birch seed?)

Large flock of bramblings at the bird feeder:

Record early Robin

Ever since I moved here in 1984, it’s been one of the year’s highlights to hear the first robin (rødstrupe) singing in the spring and I’ve recorded this event every year since. However, it’s with mixed feelings that I woke up to this year’s first song this morning, a full 7 weeks earlier than what was normal in the 80s and 2 weeks earlier than my previous record. In the city, birds have been heard singing since January in the record mild January here…
A great tit (kjøttmeis) accompanies the robin in the second video!

Close encounters

I’ve had a couple of close encounters with birds the last couple of days:
1) My local robin (rødstrupe) has been getting braver and braver over the last week and yesterday came and joined me and even sang to me…this is the robin’s sub-song, much more subdued than the main song:

…and it had something caught around one of its feet…I thought initially it was plastic, but it looks natural, so it will hopefully free itself. Perhaps it was asking for help? :)

2) I noticed this feral pigeon (bydue) on the driveway picking up seeds (birch?). I’ve never seen a feral pigeon before in the garden and I’ve never even see the common woodpigeons (ringduer), that breed in the garden, on the driveway. The only time I’ve seen a pigeon/dove before on the driveway was a probable rare Mongolian Turtle Dove a couple of years ago in winter. I started filming and to my suprise it walked towards me and passed very close and continued towards the house. This behaviour wouldn’t be unusual in the city centre, but it still took me by surprise.

I went indoors and watched it feeding outside the kitchen….and then suddenly there was a commotion in the living room. It had walked into the house and tried to fly through the window glass and was stunned hung upside down amongst the Begonias! I managed to grab hold of it and it flew off…

…and sat on the outhouse roof before disappearing!

My friend Robin redbreast!

I was in the garden most of the day, sawing up firewood and storing it for the winter. I was followed around by my friend the robin (rødstrupe) and he even sang to me at 1m distance! When I first moved here robins were shy forest birds, but they have become less and less shy over the years as is the case further south in Europe! In this short film, he catches a worm as he’s following me! I guess this weak song is a love song rather than a “you’re a rival, keep out of my territory” song ;)