Swallows and skuas

A few days of warm south-easterlies and the prospect of a good weekend prompted SÁ, YK, GÞ and me to head out of Reykjavík on the first Friday in May for the glacier country of south-east Iceland. After a long drive in fading light we reached Hof at around 2 o'clock in the morning. It's a great pity in many ways to bypass the scenery en route in the twilight but the nights are become ever briefer and at 2 o'clock it was already brighter than it had been at 1 o'clock. The eternal daylight of summer is almost upon us. The farms at Hof are backed by Iceland's highest mountain, 2,110 metre Hvannadalshnúkur (see November 2005 diary) and on the other side a vast expanse of sand stretches to the invisible sea. This makes the farms in this area a magnet for migrant and vagrant birds and after seeking out a couple of House Sparrows Passer domesticus at its sole Icelandic breeding site we weren't long to find the first alien, a plump Wood Pigeon Columba palumbus. Our ears then picked up a sound unfamiliar in Iceland but instantly recognisable to anyone who's spent any time in mainland Europe, a singing Chaffinch Fringilla coelebs. An orange flash amongst a roving flock of local Common Redpoll Carduelis flammea proved to be a female Brambling Fringilla montifringilla. Whilst none of these are particularly rare, they are nonetheless birds which we don't see that often and it meant that vagrant passerines were on the move.

And indeed for the rest of the day virtually everywhere we stopped had non-Icelandic birds of interest. A phylloscopus glimpsed flitting between the trees soon revealed its identity by singing, the first time I've heard a Willow Warbler Phylloscopus trochilus in Iceland. The first thing greeting us at the next stop was the monotonous tsip-tsip-tsap-tsip of a Chiffchaff Phylloscopus collybita but the main feature of the trip was the unprecedented number of hirrundines. We found over 50 Barn Swa llows Hirundo rustica over the weekend and 2006 is already a record year for this species in Iceland. Prior to this weekend I had seen more Buff-bellied Pipits Anthus rubescens (3) than House Martins Delichon urbicum (2) in Iceland, a very strange statistic in a European country, but this weekend's six House Martins rectified the situation. At two sites we found a much rarer Icelandic hirrundine, Sand Martin Riparia riparia, which has been seen fewer than 30 times in Iceland and one which I've now seen as often as Buff-bellied Pipit! However, as much as I enjoy seeking out rare birds the real stars of the weekend were the myriad Icelandic breeders back for the summer. Common Snipe Gallinago gallinago were never out of earshot, Whimbrels abound, two pairs of Harlequin Duck dodged the breaking ice floes on the river draining the glacial lagoon at Jökulsárlón (it would be hard to imagine a more spectacular location for this most exquisite of ducks), whilst huge numbers of Arctic Tern Sterna paradisaea occupied the sands around the lagoon. The dominant bird of this ice and wind-shaped land is the magnificent Great Skua Stercorarius skua and there were so many of them at sea and perched on the higher tussocks that you wonder how any other bird dare stray into the area. Skeins of Pink-footed Geese Anser brachyrhynchus flying with a backdrop of gleaming ice were a wonderfully evocative sight and pied meadows ofBarnacle Geese Branta leucopsis provided my first glimpse of this species this year.
On the Sunday we headed back, stopping at the cliffs at Vík in southernmost Iceland to see the air choked with commuting Puffins Fratercula arctica and at our last stop of the day we turned up the rarest bird of the weekend, a resplendent male Hawfinch Coccothraustes coccothraustes. As a child in England Hawfinches were one of the species I most wanted to see but as I noted in my October diary entry, Iceland is my preferred location in Europe to see them, which means that I've now seen three here and none anywhere else. Very warm weather (by Icelandic standards, not Birdsville Queensland standards) at the beginning of the week encouraged to spend two evenings tramping over moorlands and mountainsides around Reykjavík where the pastoral symphony of singing Golden Plovers Pluvialis apricaria and Snow Buntings Plectrophenax nivalis made my spirits soar but on Wednesday night one sighting left me on a high that will remain throughout the spring. GÞ rang me to say that he was watching my bogey bird at Stokkseyri and I headed off immediately with DB and SÁ. In the harbour we quickly set up our 'scopes and gazed out to sea hoping to see what GÞ had been watching an hour earlier. After a fruitless 45 minute search, SÁ suddenly gestured and from out of nowhere a flock of 18 Pomarine Skuas Stercorarius pomarinus headed straight for us, circled overhead, calling, and then disappeared inland. Pomarine Skuas are regular migrants but the vast majority seem to pass Iceland far out to sea and it's one of those birds that has eluded me for years, so I was delighted to finally get such superb views of this Arctic species. .