A bird-filled field-trip to Vejlerne

Af Elisabeth Skibsted Nielsen

The day begins

We have looked foreward to the planned birding-trip to Vejlerne today. We had picked a sunny day in the middle of the migration-time and we hoped to see many resting migration-birds and maybe some rare birds.

Therefore we drove from home at 9.00 a.m. and we ate rolls on the way. 1.5 hours later we drove over the dam at Bygholm Vejle and suddenly there was a lot of birds to look at! We stopped by the road and tried to look at Black-headed gulls (Hættemåge),Pied avocets (Klyde),Common shelducks (Gravand) and Eurasian oystercatchers (Strandskade) at on time. After looking at these birds a short time we drove on to the birdwatching-tower for spotting a Black-tailed godwit (Stor kobbersneppe), several ducks and Greylag geese with their irresistibly cute small goslings from the parking area. After longingly looks at the exiting birds, Father drove on to his workplace and left us with the birds.

A disturbing guest scares the birds away!

After quite a long time, with many observations of ducks fx. some Greater scaups (Bjergand), all the Barnacle geese (Bramgås) took off! They had done it several times before, but this time the ducks on the water joined them, so we knew that something was going on. Not many seconds passed before Mother shouted: “White-tailed eagle!”, and there it came, a big White-tailed eagle (Havørn), presumably a 3K owing to the bright feathers on the back and the black edges on all the tail feathers. It came closer on until it was flying right over us, very low and we were able to take good photos of it, on which we were able to see that it had GPS-tracker with solar-panel on its back. It looked down over the ducks and geese with its hawks/eagles-eye, but it didn’t get any lunch – we did on the other hand, our lunch consisted of make-your-own sandwiches, which we ate before Father came and picked us up to bring us to Lund fjord where even more bird adventures waited for us…

An invisible choir of singing birds

As soon as we stood on the parking-area at Lund fjord we heard the unmistakeable blow-in-a-bottle. It was of course a Bittern (Rørdrum)! The sound came from the reeds right north of the gravel-road so at first we seemed to walk away from the bird, if we went on a little trip on the south-side of the road. Anyway, we went out on the boardwalk, south of the road, and guess what we heard, the Bittern! We went on, out to a vantage point, where we saw some Western marsh harriers (Rørhøg) and still could we hear the “singing” Bittern, that seemed to follow us. We went on by the boardwalk, still with the bitterns singing in our ears, and reached a straight part of gravel-road, which lead to the big gravel-road, from which we came. We agreed there had to be more than one bittern, since we could hear the “song” over such a big area. On the gravel road our next adventure was waiting.

A bird scares the disturbing guests away!

It actually began quite calm, it was just a Greylag goose who lead its goslings across the road and down the ditch. We just wanted to get a bit closer and then turn around and walk out to the Lund fjord tower, but the goose didn’t agree. We went on quietly bit further down the road, but then the goose came up from the ditch, and began to cackle while it hobbled and dragged one of its wings. The goose hobbled on against the swampy place from which it and its goslings came , while it still cackled and dragged both of its wings. When it came down to the swampy place it stopped hobbling, the wings were taken up, and then it hissed at us! Therefore we decided to do a retreat, and leave the goose-family alone. We hadn’t walked many metres down the path, against the Lund fjord tower, before the goose was on its way up on the road again to fetch the goslings. What an adventure!

A cup of tea with the winged friends

Out in the Lund fjord tower we enjoyed some tea while we watched the lots of birds which included: two Great egrets (Sølvhejre) and a Grey heron (Fiskehejre) which were hunting; quite a lot of Eurasian wigeons (Pibeand) and Eurasian teals (Krikand); two Common redshanks (Rødben), which made a mating dance; a big flock of Greylag geese (Grågås) which came flying, and landed on the inlet; and in addition a dead gull. Later Father came and joined us, to eat/drink afternoon coffee, and look on the many birds. We agreed that the gull had been “regulated”, due to the sound of several shoots ,of which some of them frightened one of the Great egrets (Sølvhejre), so it took off and flew a short distance, but it wasn’t that dangerous so it landed again to go on hunting.

More birds on the way home

We drove homeward, this time over Mors. We sailed over Feggesund with the Feggesund ferry and on the Hannæs-side of the ferry-berth there was a Common ringed plover (Stor præstekrave) on a little isthmus. From the ferry we saw a Common shelduck (Gravand) as it was flying over Feggesund in the opposite direction of us. On Mors there were quite a lot of Common redshanks (Rødben) in the small pools at some tidal meadows. We ate pizza just before crossing Sallingsundbroen and enjoyed the sight of Limfjorden for the last time when we crossed the bridge, and we talked about what a good birding trip we had had. At 9.00 p.m. we arrived home, emptied the car, and went to bed. What a great birding trip!

The following is a list of the species we saw/heard. Birds we only heard: *