Miscellaneous Finnmark wildlife

Following on from the previous post, here is a selection of other wildlife bits and pieces that I photographed while wandering about Finnmark. This opening shot is a general one of the landscape. There is a mosaic of large and small lakes nestled in glaciated hollows. These lakes are fringed with various types of mire, or the basins can be entirely filled by mire. The lakes are used by diving ducks such as Tufted Duck and Goldeneye and the mires are used by breeding waders such as Wood Sandpiper, Reeve and Broad-billed Sandpiper. The hills and ridges are clothed with Birch woods and are typically used by breeding Willow Warblers, Red-spotted Bluethroats and Willow Grouse.

The Birches, Mountain Birch Betula pubescens ssp. tortuosa, are twisted and grow as if coppiced at the base. They are well spaced with dwarf birch and willow, and lichen-rich heath between.

Some of the birches have grown into marvellous shapes, and they must be very old. Perhaps it is hundreds of years since the seeds germinated.

There were lots of these Cranberry Fritillary Bolaria aquilonaris butterflies sunning themselves on the lichen covered gaps between the trees. Or I think that is what they are, if anyone knows better, please advise.

The butterfly's body was covered with long hairs, an adaptation to life in high northern forests, where it can be cold at any time of year.

Another butterfly that was flying at the same time was this Arctic Ringlet Erebia disa. Several of these were flitting over and landing on the mires, the type which was dominated by a carpet of sphagnum moss with abundant stems of Hare's Tail Cotton Grass Eriphorum vaginatum, a food plant for the larvae.

Another plant that grows in the woodland is Juniper Juniperus communis. These small trees are probably as old as the birches if not older, but not all those grey stems are juniper, there is a Greenshank Tringa nebularia sitting on its nest at the base of this one.

Down in the valleys there are hay meadows, and most have a rich yellow cast of buttercups. And some also have stands of Globeflower Trollus europaeus. They like the rich wet soils on the flat open fields.

And next to one field rich with Globeflower, I found a large stand of Tall Jacob's Ladder Polemonium acutiflorum, a stunning plant of wet rich soil, and typically found in old hay meadows in northen Scandinavia. It reminded me of Himalayan Blue Poppy.

Simple beauty.

Finnmark birds

A Common Crane strides with ease through dwarf birch and willow scrub on the edge of a mire in  Finnmark, arctic Norway.

I was there to continue helping with surveys and monitoring of birds. For more information, follow this link to the main part of the project, Broad-billed Sandpiper study. The study is still ongoing, as we have deployed geolocator tags on the sandpipers and aim the retrieve them next summer when the birds return from their wintering grounds. So, this post gives only a brief sample of some of the other birds I saw while in the area.

Whimbrel are one of the larger waders that breed in the tundra, especially on lichen-rich heaths or as in this case, cloudberry-crowberry dominated peaty heath next to a mire.

There were a few rainy days when all was quiet. This Ringed Plover was sitting tight on its nest next to a road. The birds colouring fitted well with the lichen-crusted ground.

Out on the mires, there were numerous Red-necked Phalaropes on the open water of tiny pools in the extensive swards of sedges and mosses.

These are great birds, my friends, as they eat hundreds and thousands of mosquitoes, picking them off the water surface or the leaves of waterside vegetation. The mosquitoes make working in the mires extremely difficult due to their incessant biting and swarming around face and hands.

This female Lapland Bunting was feeding on insects, hopefully mosquitoes, in a patch of peat hummocks covered with Labrador tea, cloudberry, crowberry and bilberry.

Her mate was close beside her all the time she was out in the open. The patterns of their markings are similar, but that of the male is much bolder. The flower beside him is Labrador tea.

Down in the valleys, where there are taller trees, woodland passerines are more common, like this female Common Redstart in a Scots pine wood.

Her partner might be more brightly coloured, but he still blended in well with the reds and greys of the pine bark.

It might seem that there is not much to see in the vast landscape of apparently endless mires and woods of Finnmark, but there are plenty, lots, of birds nesting and rearing their young there every summer. Just look a little more closely.