To the Peatlands

One evening at dusk we watch a mother and calf moose feed on the edge of a clearfell; the only thing I remember clearly now is how long her legs were, as if she'd been drawn by a carefree child with little concern for the banalities of proportion. They are wary to our blunderings and move quickly back into cover. Later, a Nightjar churrs in the gloaming around the cabin - this is about as far north as they go, any further and they run out of night. In the midday sun a Black Woodpecker dips and rises from one side of the lake to the other, Redstart and Pied Flycatcher juveniles peaking out of holes to wonder what the fuss is about. Underfoot, Hazel Grouse creep through the Labrador Tea, and a flock of Waxwing alight on their journeys eastwards; later, more would trill from the tops of the biggest pines on the edges of the peatlands.

To get to the peatlands there is always a bumpy drive down a forestry track. In May the grouse aren't laying yet, so Hazel Grouse, Willow Grouse, Black Grouse and Capercaillie are regularly gritting up on the fringes. When disturbed they aren't particularly shy; sometimes as the car approaches they hop over the ditch and stand watchfully in the vegetation; others take flight and perch on branches, and others still barrel through the trees like cannonballs. Of course in Britain we are envious of the abundance of Galliformes here and posit that these Finnish forests must be some kind of natural nirvana; recent research shows that severe Willow Tit declines in Finland are due to a shortage of standing deadwood for them to nest in, a consequence of intensive harvesting methods.

Female Capercaillie near Puohtiinsuo, May 2023

The density of drains in these forests is also something to behold; many of the forests and farms here were once mires, converted to forest for economic gain. But that doesn't mean they don't have birds: it's on the last serious pines before the bog drains the trees of life that the Rustic Buntings flit; theirs is an indeterminate song, sweet and melodic but easy to overlook. They are sought after here, but it's a struggle finding their charm; they flit nervously from tree to tree, singing from the spot you least expect them, and rarely sit comfortably to be observed. My friend wants nothing to do with them; he's here for the grouse and waders he says, and that's that. Later a pair of showily acrobatic Hobbies will easily charm that notion from him.

Alarm calling Whimbrel, at Honkavaaransuo, June 2023

Further in towards the peatlands, the drains start to lose their battle and the ground squelches and ripples underfoot: the mawkish aroma of Labrador Tea fades and now cottongrasses tremble between the waterlogged, pencil thin pines. Another few steps and a Whimbrel scurries off a nest and then flutters between stunted trees as we pass. In Finland you don't get much by way of open horizons or perspective; most of it is flat and covered in forest. So when the bog does opens up and you can finally look towards a distant horizon it is strangely freeing; perhaps that's being from a country with few trees and lots of open space: irrespective, there's immediately a sense that these peatlands could be stumbled across for quite some time before anything resembling fatigue might set in.