Bird Picture of the Week / Ukens Fuglebilde

All over northern Scandinavia, Eastern vagrants of the bird-world have yet again found their way to the west - driven by the plenty of rowanberries as is so often the case in October/November.

Large amounts of thrushes and waxwings have invaded the north Norwegian coast during the last two weeks and here and there the beautiful Pine Grosbeaks / Konglebit / Tallbit can also be seen feasting on the rowanberries while singing their melodious tones.

The bird picture of the week will be one out of many shots taken of this colourful finch from the East.

Pine Grosbeak (Pinicola enucleator) / Konglebit / Tallbit

 

Bird Picture of the Week / Ukens Fuglebilde

It has been a very long break in the series "Bird Picture of the Week", so I feel that I have to start out small when trying to take up the thread again...

Therefore, I`ll re-start with a photo from yesterday of no other than the smallest bird in Europe, the Goldcrest (Regulus regulus).

Goldcrest / Fuglekonge / Kungsfågel

Solar Storm

After a strong geomagnetic storm on Oct 13, bright auroras have been seen over much of the planet - also far south of the aurora zone. When the storm first hit us, North America was on the night side and here in Scandinavia it was bright day.

The following nights have been characterized by mainly strong pulsating auroras covering the entire sky with the occasional surge in intensity creating curtains, rays and coronas shining through the "aurora haze".

One effect of being in the middle of a storm as soon as the sun set was that the most prominent parts of the Milky Way was still high up in the sky and the auroras coloured it in red and green.  The Andromeda Galaxy can be seen as a "smudge" in the lower right of this photo.

Milky Way and Auroras

Full Moon Auroras

After midnight the rain-clouds parted and revealed a spectacular view of the Full Moon surrounded by bright and unusually colourful Northern Lights in green and purple.

All three photos are taken due south - the light of dawn can be seen on the second photo.