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But No Defense For Us
These posts are usually scheduled to publish in advance of the date. Yesterday I was barely awake before I saw the news from Las Vegas. By then my post for the day was up and running. But I can’t just put up another nature post today. It’s been too awful a week, another nadir in…
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Scandonata
So they have the same meadow hawk problem over there. These Sympetrum dragonflies are hard to ID in camera. Looks like S. vulgatum or S. striolatum are the options. Found around the moat of the Kastellet in Copenhagen, where the word for them is Hedelibel, or darter. The following mating damselflies were spotted in the…
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Calling Names
Robert Macfarlane’s essay on nature and children, naming and literature, got me thinking about the first big book I read myself. It was Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, which is, of course, three books. I was ten-ish, a late bloomer. As it happens, a new book called Flora of Middle Earth also delves into the name…
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Scandinavian Miscellanea
A rose gall.The Black Raven, a bit redundant. Slow down, there are cats here. Pike, innit?Four dragon tails curl into the spire at the old stock exchange in Copenhagen. Another Danish dragon.Another mythological Dane, Den Lille Havfrue. She was splashed with red paint earlier this year to protest whale and dolphin killing by Faroe islanders.…
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Birds in Hand III
Spotted Crake (Porzana porzana).Småfläckig sumphöna. Our Sora is in the same genus.They netted another, this one substantially smaller than the first, so it had some chowing down to do before taking off for Africa. These birds eat insects and other aquatic yummies found in marshes. [The birds are weighed and checked for body fat, which…
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Raptor Wednesday
Within three hours of New York City, there are a number of places where you can spot soaring and south-bound migrating raptors this time of year. The most famous is the farthest away: Hawk Mountain in PA. I’ve been once; it was a pretty slow day for hawks. That’s always the gamble: are the weather…
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Birds in Hand II
The Flommen reedbeds, just north of the lighthouse, are also set up with mist nets by the folks at the Falsterbo Fågelstation. Here’s a Grasshopper Warbler (Locustella naevia) they netted just before we visited. Gräshoppsångare is more likely to be heard than seen. This was a first netted example for our guide, Evan, who worked…
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Galls
You may know of my fascination with galls, the structures created by plants in response to insects. In the Botanisk Have in Copenhagen and in the Alnapsparken at Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet, the Swedish agricultural college, I found these lovely knopper oak galls. They were growing on acorns of Quercus robur, the great oak of Europe, which…
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Birds in Hand
We attended a ringing demonstration at the Falsterbo Fågelstation. Karin, a volunteer at the observatory located at the Falsterbo fyr (lighthouse) also works there, reporting the weather every three hours. She has a molting Robin (Erithacus rubecula), or Rödhake in hand. Largest size ring here is for swans. A rather smaller one goes on the…
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A Cacophony of Corvids
Malmö’s landmark Turning Torso, with Hooded Crows, Rooks, and Jackdaws on the fence. Add the Magpie, and even urban areas in Denmark and Sweden are well represented by the members of the Corvidae.A Rook (Corvus frugilegus) — råka — with some leucristic feather action.Hooded Crow (Corvus cornix), gråkråka, and Magpie (Pica pica), skata.One of the…
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