Beautiful Auroras tonight 🙂
Took a drive just outside town with my camera. The lights from Selfoss town can be seen in the distance.
I never tire of admiring the Northern Ligths.
Monthly Archives: October 2014
Winter is coming
It’s been snowing today and tonight there’s a storm with temperatures below zero. I think winter is coming.
Common Crossbill
Common Crossbills are new breeding birds in Iceland. New spruce and pine forests are growing fast in many places in Iceland and are now big enough to be a habitat for some new settlers like the Crossbills.
They are regular birds in my garden and I feed them on sunflower seeds. This pair was in a group of seven Crossbills coming to the feeding place this beautiful Sunday morning.
A visitor in the garden
This beautiful female Brambling appeared in the garden yesterday and again today. Bramblings are annual guests in Iceland. They come from Scandinavia but do not breed here.
Hopefully a male Brambling will visit us next week but then the forecast says colder weather and snow. – Makes life easier for our little friends to come and get the food we set out for them 🙂
Female Blackcap
This is one of the female blackcaps I mentioned earlier. Although she´s shy I managed to capture this picture of her while she was enjoying the apple. The other female is gone, driven away by this one who seems to be the spouse.
The most common garden bird
In former times Redpolls could only be found in birch forests in North Iceland. In the sixties they started to breed in South Iceland and are now among the most common breeding birds in woods and gardens. Around 50-70 Redpolls visit the feeder in my garden every day.
Redpolls are my favourites because they are very active, charming and have a great diversity in colour and appearance.
Redpolls and Common Crossbills
Click to see the video – garden birds
A lot of Redpolls and Common Crossbills come everyday to feed in the garden. They get along very well and seem to like each other’s company. But when the Blackbird comes along he scares them away from the feeding tray.
A lot of Redpolls and Common Crossbills come everyday to feed in the garden. They get along very well and seem to like each other’s company. But when the Blackbird comes along he scares them away from the feeding tray.
– This video is taken today and there is a lot of traffic to and from the feeding tray.
Three Blackcaps now
Another female Blackcap has now joined the pair from yesterday (see previous post). The three of them are feeding in the garden. Here is the male eating an apple that I placed on a twig. The girls are a bit shy and not at all fond of the camera.
– Stay tuned and see if I manage to get a good photo of them.
Sunrise and sunset in the volcanic mist
Six weeks ago a volcanic eruption started in Bárðarbunga in Vatnajökull Glacier, more precisely in Holuhraun, just outside the glacier. Seismicity continues in the Bárðarbunga area, see:
http://en.vedur.is/earthquakes-and-volcanism/earthquakes/
The eruption is in full action and the flow of lava has by now created a lavafield of over 55 square kilometers. It is estimated that the eruption produces 35,000 tons of SO2 daily both from the craters and the lava field. The gas pollution spreads over different parts of Iceland depending on the direction of the wind. The gas alters the clear skies and our sunrise isn’t as dazzling and blinding as usual.
Photos from Selfoss South Iceland at sunset 12 October and sunrise 13 October.
Blackcap
This male Blackcap visited my garden this morning. He was not shy when I came along with my camera. But it was difficult to get close to the female who accompanied him. The Blackcap is a vagrant in Iceland but an annual guest in my garden and sometimes I have managed to keep a few of them alive through the whole winter.
– Stay tuned for updates on this couple.