Birthday gift for Roni - birding at the border in southeast Finland
My son Roni turned 15 last week and he wished for a full day birding trip to southeast Finland as a gift. Well, what could I do but agree :) On Saturday morning, 17 of May, we woke up at 5 a.m., had a quick breakfast and jumped into our car. Montagu's Harrier (Circus pygargus) at Kantelejärvi We took the highway to south and turned to east at Hyvinkää, our first destination was lake Kantele at Pukkila. I parked the car on the south side of the lake, there was a good view to whole area. Thrush Nightingale was singing behind us, some Barn Swallows and Common Swifts were up in the sky, two Geese were flying east and lonely Whooper Swan was resting at the lake. And then I saw it! Montagu's Harrier was approaching us from the other side of the lake! Gorgeous male, cool! Finally it came pretty close to us and we got a very good view of it :) Soon it disappeared, probably landed somewhere. We saw still a pair of Marsh Harriers, but as they are very common here where we live, ...