The end of March this year was mild with little frost. I was surprised to find the first flowering sallow / selje (Salix caprea) on 19th March and by the end of the month some larger trees were in full flower providing much needed food for a myriad of insects include wild bees, bumble bees and most of the 13 moth species shown below, all of which were photographed in my garden at the end of March, attracted by a moth trap. In turn, birds are attracted to the insect feast and some also feed on the nectar directly.
9 days after the picture of the first flowers was taken above and the whole tree was in flower
At the Ringve Botanical Garden in Trondheim there were several fowering sallows on the 29th March
Ringve: I noticed both blue tits (blåmeis) and great tit (kjøttmeis) in the tree and the blue tits seemed to be feeding on the catkins (nectar; a known food for these birds)
Ringve: I was surprised also to see a goldcrest (fuglekonge) flycatching in the tree!
Another nice tree in flower on the shore line at Ranheim!
It’s always a surprise when I’m woken to the song of a wren (gjerdesmett) in the garden at this time of year. This is not only the second smallest bird in Norway, but along with the smallest bird goldcrest (fuglekonge) they rely almost only on natural food and don’t come to bird feeders. It’s been a relatively snow rich winter with stable conditions over long periods, but somehow this bird has made it through the winter. There have been reports of wrens regularly through the winter in this area, so it’s likely that it has overwintered (some of the local population migrate to milder areas in western Europe). I haven’t heard them in the daytime yet this year, so it’s probably spending the night in one of the bird boxes in the garden and finding food elsewhere!
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Nice to know that I can still hear the very high pitched call of the goldcrest (fuglekonge) aka Regulus regulus. That’s what alerted me to their presence in my largest Norway spruce (gran) trees in the garden this morning. Astonishing that Norway’s smallest bird manages to survive this cold (only one day above zero C since New Year) and largely on natural food, only rarely coming to bird feeders. A couple of bad pictures grabbed from a very shaky film I made of a female (yellow crest):
The goldcrest (fuglekonge) delivered by the cat today reminded me of another winter goldcrest! My schoolfriend Geoff Gale was visiting in late winter and we were in the mountains at Storlien just over the border in Sweden at the tree line. We’d just started (cross-country) skiing and suddenly we saw a goldcrest climbing a birch tree looking for food. It subsequently flew onto Geoff’s back (thinking no doubt he was dead wood ;) ). I grabbed the camera and just as I was going to take a memorable picture….it flew over to me and proceeded to examine me for insects…… ;) (Geoff will probably remind me that the order of events was a bit different…)
Nevertheless, I really hadn’t expected to see Norway’s smallest bird in this kind of habitat at this time of year!
The cat brought in an unexpected gift this morning here on Nesodden, a female goldcrest (fuglekonge), Norway’s smallest bird! It took some time to recover, but eventually flew away….happy ending.
Fuglekongen means bird king in Norwegian, but this was a queen, fugledronningen!
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden
