It should probably not be surprising that a very large island, with only 25% of its surface being free from permanent ice (at least for the time being,) would not be the kind of place one would expect to find a wide variety of bird life, even more so in the Northern Hemisphere, where Penguins choose not to live. That is indeed the case for Greenland, and while the open, treeless landscape can make seeing what birds are there fairly easy to see, there certainly aren’t very many birds to choose from, both in terms of diversity of species, and absolute numbers.

Like everything else in Greenland, bird life is focused near the long coastlines, with the result that most of the country’s checklist consists of pelagic, shoreline, and similar types of birds. With most of the possibilities from those types of species already appearing in my List, there were not many opportunities for me to add new members from that group. I was also surprised that the numbers of individuals in many places was much lower than what I thought it should have been. I did notice, because the sea water near shore was usually exceptionally clear, that there seemed to be relatively few fish and other marine life there, compared to other places I have seen, so perhaps that situation place a role.

What terrestrial birds are present are a subset of those also found in Iceland, so I did not expect much help on dry land. Nevertheless, there were a few birds that I have missed seeing elsewhere that could have turned up and, as usual I kept my eyes searching the landscape, because you never know what surprises might present themselves.

As it turned out, I only saw two new species during my two weeks in the country. The first was White-Tailed Eagle. A pair were soaring around the harbor in Qaqortoq as I returned from the Hvalsey Church boat trip.

The second took me a little by surprise, but only because of where I saw it. Purple Sandpiper was the only small shorebird that could have been new for me in both Iceland and Greenland. I failed in Iceland, despite spending a long time trying to convert a photo of a Dunlin into one of those. Eventually, I saw this one at a chilly pool of meltwater adjacent to the Ice Sheet, which I was definitely not expecting.

So one large raptor, and one diminutive shorebird, not exactly a great result. However, in a place like Greenland, I suppose I should be pleased with whatever I was able to find.