It almost goes without saying that it was cold calm and sunny again - making the work related drive to Stavanger a struggle - driving into low sun throughout.
Even worse was driving past good one good birding spot after another:) It is no wonder the region is the heartland of Norwegian birding.
Just before dark on 01 February a walk out of the hotel through Stavanger city centre to find somewhere to eat saw us pass Breiavatnet - a mostly frozen lake in the middle of town. At least four Moorehen sivhøne and hundreds of Tufted Duck toppand were among the sightings.
The next day was spent messing around in a small boat in Hillevåg. The first bird to swim past forced me to pick up my camera - a nice Great Crested Grebe toppdykker - a very good bird back home in Øygarden. Coot sothøne, Moorehen sivhøne (both would have been good sightings back home), a few Black-headed Gulls hettemåke and more were seen incidentally during a fun day of multibeam echosounder mayhem.
Early the next morning a few hundred Starling stær flew over the city centre, no doubt from a roost site somewhere nearby.
Back on the boat at Hillevåg on 03 February it was more of the same with the addition of a female Scaup bergand. It didn't quite "click" in the field and I did consider female tufty at the time. However, I was at work and not birding so I snapped a few pictures and left it that. Looking at the pictures now I see that it could be a hybrid Scaup/Tufted Duck. The bird has a rather dark back to be a Scaup and there is a broad black band to the bill tip which are pro Tufted Duck features. Head shape, the amount of white and the paler cheek patch all point towards Scaup.
After a long day on the boat I saw a Snipe enkeltbekkasin fly into Breiavatnet at 2030 in the evening.
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