Midsummer with ups and downs

Midsummer is a weekend that we celebrate here in Sweden. We have the longest days of the year and the nights are almost as bright as the cloudy days during winter. We eat the traditional lunch consisting of pickled herring with boiled potatoes, chives and sour cream. Cream and strawberries are also a must for dessert.

This year we had the lunch at a farmyard and that was because this Midsummer Eve was Pixies, Marias niece, birthday. So she got to decide what we should do during the day and she wanted to pet animals and ride a pony. The farmyard was littered by families as we weren´t the only ones with the same idea. We spent an hour or two there before we headed home as I had to prepare the meat that we were going to barbecue for dinner.

My hope for this Midsummer to get out and hopefully do some photography at a couple of places, but unfortunately I had a hiccup. You might have noticed that Lensman was down and that was of course due to me. It took me a complete day to restore it to its former glory and I hope to have learned a lesson now, but I am not sure of that.

Checking the Arendal area

Still I managed to get out in the morning at Midsummers Eve. I wanted to check out the Osprey and hopefully get some nice photos of it fishing. At first I couldn´t find them so I stayed at a reed bed trying to take photos of the European Reed Warblers, but they are not the easiest ones to photo. I got a couple of photos of the Reed Warbler together with a nice photo of a flying Bearded Reedling, who just quickly passed by, before I noticed the Osprey.

It was fishing over the same lake as last time so I went back and positioned myself at the same spot. I know that it hunts just in front of this spot and it doesn´t seem to be bothered by my presence so I might get what I am after. That was at least my thought before I discovered that the Osprey were chased by a Gull couple. This meant it couldn´t fish at the spot in front of me as this probably were too close to the nest site. A setback, but I could still watch it hunt and I hope to be more prepared next time. I will then probably use my bag hide to hopefully get a little bit closer to the action.

This setback made me do a survey of the area further out closer to the harbor and the windmill’s there. I have never been there before, but I could see that there the place teemed with life.

None of the pictures is of the highest quality, but I like the dreamy feeling in the Bearded Reedling picture. That picture together with the one of the three flying Common Eider females are the ones that I like the most.