What birds (are you/have you been) watching? What birds have been watching you?

[doversoul1]

The first yellowhammer has arrived.

[Stanfordian]

In my garden on the west coast of Lancashire I saw a bird that I've never ever seen here before. I'm struggling to identify it but the
nearest I can get to an picture in my reference book of it is a female white wagtail. I was stuck by the length of the tail.

[Vox Humana]

In my garden on the west coast of Lancashire I saw a bird that I've never ever seen here before. I'm struggling to identify it but the
nearest I can get to an picture in my reference book of it is a female white wagtail. I was stuck by the length of the tail.

If it had a long tail and wasn't a parakeet there's really nothing else it can be other than a wagtail or a Long-tailed Tit. White Wagtail (the continental race of our Pied Wagtail) would be unusual this early in the year (we tend to get them during migration), so I'd put my money on a female Pied Wagtail.

[vinteuil]

.

... there were three trotty wagtails just outside our house in the street this morning.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_Bm_aB3ZpEI/T2JSqXRsR8I/AAAAAAAAKSk/m5JYbprFJvc/s1600/pied-wagtail.jpg

Little trotty wagtail he went in the rain
And tittering tottering sideways he near got straight again
He stooped to get a worm and look’d up to catch a fly
And then he flew away e’re his feathers they were dry

Little trotty wagtail he waddled in the mud
And left his little foot marks trample where he would
He waddled in the water pudge and waggle went his tail
And chirrupt up his wings to dry upon the garden rail

Little trotty wagtail you nimble all about
And in the dimpling water pudge you waddle in and out
Your home is nigh at hand and in the warm pigsty
So little Master Wagtail I’ll bid you a ‘Good bye’

John Clare [1793-1864]

[Richard Tarleton]

If it had a long tail and wasn't a parakeet there's really nothing else it can be other than a wagtail or a Long-tailed Tit. White Wagtail (the continental race of our Pied Wagtail) would be unusual this early in the year (we tend to get them during migration), so I'd put my money on a female Pied Wagtail.

I was going to reply in similar vein....Also habitat and behaviour - what was it doing (see vinteuil's post) - if walking or trotting, a wagtail of some description....The only other possibility would be (you were struck by the length of the tail) a (female?) grey wagtail, imperfectly seen? You may not have noticed the yellow? Grey wags normally near water, pied on lawns, rooftops etc.

What was the call? Pied wagtais a pleasing "Chiswick, Chiswick"

Our pied wagtails Motacilla alba yarrellii but a subspieces of the nominate continental race M.a. alba - a member of another subspecies from central Asia/N India caused a bit of a stir hereabouts recently.

[vinteuil]

.

... this I found interesting -

https://www.livingwithbirds.com/tweetapedia/21-facts-on-pied-wagtail

[Richard Tarleton]

Indeed, a useful list. That, and the poem, underline how important what the bird was doing and where you saw it are to i/d - whereas people who have seen mystery birds normally start by trying to tell you what colour it was. As Bill Oddie says, it's usually a jay - unless it's on a vicarage lawn, when it might be a hoopoe. The older bird books partly to blame - illustrations in the old days usually limited to neat profiles, until bird artists like Peter Hayman (see his 1975 Mitchell Beazley guide) reminded us that birds are usually flying away from you when you see them, and illustrated them accordingly. And then artists like John Busby and Eric Ennion captured birds in a few dramatic brushstokes - catching that hard-to-define quality of jizz which birders talk about. Nowadays the Collins Bird Guide (Svenson, Zetterstrom and Mullarney) for Europe, and RSPB British birds (Holden and Cleeves) probably the best to have on your windowsill.

This was the scene in the field next to my house yesterday - 14 of them altogether, hanging out with the cattle. I saw my first little egret in Mallorca in 1982, before their invasion of the UK, now I can see them from my front door

[ardcarp]

They weren't cattle egrets by any chance? I can't tell from the picture (little egrets have yellow feet) but apparently cattle egrets are now appearing in S-England, just as little egrets did 25 years ago.

https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/bird-and-wildlife-guides/bird-a-z/c/cattleegret/

[Serial_Apologist]

Everything appears to be later than last year here in London - temperatures have generally been a few degrees below seasonal norms. The first snowdrops have started to flower, but no signs of crocus, let alone daffs, and neither song thrush nor blackbirds yet heard. At one time the latter would have been the norm - we used to say that blackbirds and song thrushes start their singing in the second week of February, but lately this has been known to happen in January or even before Christmas!

[Richard Tarleton]

They weren't cattle egrets by any chance? I can't tell from the picture (little egrets have yellow feet) but apparently cattle egrets are now appearing in S-England, just as little egrets did 25 years ago.

https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wi...c/cattleegret/

No, definitely little I'm very alive to the possibility of cattle egrets, and am keeping a close eye. There is a single cattle egret in North Pembrokeshire at present. Little have long slender necks, long blackish bills - cattle altogether stumpier birds, with shorter yellow bills (I've seen just about all the herons it's possible to see in Europe, and several more New World species). They're certainly behaving like cattle egrets.

[ardcarp]

Thanks. I've just realised about the bill-colour!

On a different subject, Mrs A and I have been seeing a couple of water rails which have taken up winter residence on our local marshes.

[Lat-Literal]

Lovely thread.

I have been training my mind to listen to birdsong when I wake up and on any early morning walk. This is calming but it also feels a bit strange and slightly ill. Not sure where that connotation arose and it is nonsensical. I am leaving the madness of the morning news and aren't there a million members of the RSPB? It would probably feel regular if I could identify these birds from what I hear (I can't) and see them in the trees (which isn't always the case). But I do like pure sound that isn't hampered by anything like knowledge. And I do know some things. I know I've seen a blackbird in these the very outer suburbs and there is an extraordinary number of seagulls around here. They must be inland seagulls.

[Richard Tarleton]

If you did feel like taking it further, lat, now is the time of year to get to grips with birdsong, when it's possible to catch a glimpse of the chanteurs - it's not hard to get on top of our resident birds, several species already singing well, before all the spring migrants arrive to confuse things, and the leaves come on the trees to hide them. There are a few useful mnemonics which help......

[Lat-Literal]

If you did feel like taking it further, lat, now is the time of year to get to grips with birdsong, when it's possible to catch a glimpse of the chanteurs - it's not hard to get on top of our resident birds, several species already singing well, before all the spring migrants arrive to confuse things, and the leaves come on the trees to hide them. There are a few useful mnemonics which help......

I would like the useful mnemonics.

Also, does a CD of birdsong help - I have one but have never absorbed it.

[Richard Tarleton]

I would like the useful mnemonics.

Also, does a CD of birdsong help - I have one but have never absorbed it.

Well....Blackbird - you can watch them singing and learn them that way, but....rich contralto, tailing off into unmusical ending
Song thrush - lots of different phrases, but everything repeated 2-3 times
Robin - inconclusive thread of melody
Chaffinch - chirrup-chirrup-chirrup-chirrup-sowayyyooo (NB chaffinches have local accents)
Wren - trill ending in metallic buzz......

That sort of thing - there are plenty more

I like the BTO CD "Learning Bird Songs and Calls" but there are several others - BBC, British Library....CDs useful for checking something you've heard, rather than trying to learn them in advance.