Weedon’s World
Thanks to the need to get his bike’s bearings fixed, Mike just happened to find his best bird of the year!
When having to have his bicycle fixed, Mike landed his best bird of the year!
As I said last month, Peterborough’s easily accessible (by bike) Ferry Meadows CP, has been a key component of my ‘lockdown exercise’ routine. I have been going there just about every morning before work (at home, of course) and I’ve never enjoyed a spring in the park as much as this one! In the last month (it is, as I write, mid-May) I have added 15 birds to my FMCP year list. And these have included some great birds, such as Black Tern (x2), Hobby, Nightingale (x2), Whinchat (x2) and even a fly-through Whimbrel.
But my best bird of the lockdown period came on 1 May. In fact, it is also one of the best birds I have seen this year and certainly my best ‘find’. You can, of course, guess what it is from the picture on the right.
Here is its story. Having been cycling every day for exercise, my poor bike was getting a bit of an extra working over. This was particularly true toward the end of April, when I had a couple of weeks’ holiday and cycle-birding was the best thing to do! This, in turn, led to a bit of looseness in the bearings of the rear wheels…
My son Eddie and I had planned to do some slightly longer cycling expeditions over the first weekend in May, so I wanted a bike I could rely on. Hence, I phoned a couple of bike shops and found one that was open which happened to be on the main entrance road from the south into Ferry Meadows! So, I booked my bike in for 9.30am on 1 May.
Come May Day, I was in the park nice and early and birding, as usual. I enjoyed listening to the two wonderful Nightingales in full song in a scrubby, Hawthorn-packed area called Coney Meadow. I ticked Reed Warbler for my FM2020 year list. I even found a family of Grey Wagtails I hadn’t previously known about (with fully grown young). By 9am I had already racked up more than 60 species, and was thinking of drifting down to the bike shop (intending to walk back into the park and do some more birding, while the cycle guys did their magic).
At 9.25am, I was just cycling out of the park, heading to the bike menders, thinking about nothing, when my ever-active birding ears thought they heard something unusual. I stopped and listened: “Probably a misheard bit of Wren song,” I almost said out loud. But then the bird sang again: it was the glorious ‘spinning silver sixpence’ song of a Wood Warbler.
I immediately phoned my friend Don, who lives very near the park (and I knew would strongly want to see a Wood Warbler!), but I told him my appointment at the bike shop was at 9.30am, so I wasn’t going to be able to hang around for him. Before I took my bike in, though,
I just fancied a quick wee look at this special bird (and Wood Warblers really are special!). I walked into the narrow strip of trees next to the road, from which the song was coming, and a minute or so later, I caught a glimpse of the singer in the canopy, its whole body quivering as it delivered this incredible shivering song. I looked round and, as if by magic, Don appeared!
I told him where the bird was, but he had already heard it, ticked it and added it to his enormous Ferry Meadows list (which he tells me is now 197 bird species!). Ten minutes later, I was back on foot (with my bike being mended) and again watching and listening to the Wood Warbler, with Don. It could be very hard to see, but when relocated, it stayed very loyal to its few perches and gave superb views.
Just to give you an idea how scarce they are here, it was just the fifth Wood Warbler I have seen anywhere in the Peterborough area in 20 years (and the second I have ‘found’; both singing spring males). It wasn’t the brightest of birds (as Wood Warblers go), with a hint of greyish on the mantle, like the small picture in the Collins Bird Guide. But he was a Wood Warbler, and it was my ‘find’!
The warbler hung around for less than two hours, singing frequently, interspersed by catching little green caterpillars from the canopy. Mostly, it would do the shimmering trill song, but a couple of times, it did the introductory ‘pew pew pew’ before the trill. At 11.10am, it started repeating ‘pew’ calls, as if anxious. A Great Tit was also chattering, nearby; and it felt like there was a close predator, by the birds’ calls.
Then, the Wood Warbler left its perch and was never seen or heard again. But it was great while it lasted!
IT WAS JUST THE FIFTH WOOD WARBLER I HAVE SEEN IN THE PETERBOROUGH AREA
Mike Weedon is an obsessive patch lister and keen wildlife photographer in his home city of Peterborough, where he lives with his wife, Jo, and children, Jasmine and Eddie. You can see his photos at weedworld. blogspot.com