Not quite the curlew I thought it was
WHEN we think of migrant spring birds returning to our shores for the breeding season we tend to think of swallows and house martins, cuckoos and chiffchaffs.
Less so the multitude of seabirds and other assorted raptors, waders and songbirds which also nest here in spring and summer.
And among the arrivals was one which took me by surprise on a visit to North Devon over the Easter weekend.
I get up to Appledore fairly often, and there are generally plenty of waders and waterfowl to be spotted at low tide. In the winter large flocks of golden plover can be seen along with oystercatchers, brent geese, shelduck and all manner of other species which like nothing better than paddling about in the muddy sand slurping up worms or shellfish.
The winter migrants have departed, but the oystercatchers remain in noisy abundance, and there is always the possibility of a tardy curlew or two to be spotted.
When one flew in and landed at the tideline some distance in front of me, I hardly bothered to raise my binoculars for a second glance. But when I did I noticed it didn’t quite look to be all there. Where’s it’s long downcurved beak? I wondered.
When it turned I saw that it was there alright, but so much shorter that the typical half longbow sported by a curlew.
I did a double-take, and looked more closely, noting the dark top to the head bordered by a pale line over the eyes.
This was no curlew, but instead its far rarer relative the whimbrel.
To give some idea of its relative abundance, we get 66,000 breeding pairs of curlews in Britain, but a mere 400 pairs of whimbrels.
They nest at the top of Scotland, so this one was just passing through on its way north from its wintering grounds in Africa.
I haven’t seen many and the clue to clinching identification is that their call is a repeated sequence of seven short whistles.
Fortunately the ‘Seven-Whistler’, as it is known, gave me a rendition as it flew off, as if to say ‘There-I-am-a -whimbrel-happy-now?’. Indeed I was.