Rambling bramblings stay chirpy in delayed entrance

BEFORE THESE birds appeared in my garden it was already clear from social media posts that something like a full-scale invasion of Yorkshire had been under way for the past two months. So it is with some relief that I can finally say I have been visited by bramblings.

They are easy enough to overlook, being the same size and shape as the familiar chaffinch with whom they often form mixed flocks.

At first glance, the males of both species have similar colourings on their chests and upper wings, but closer inspection shows the chaffinch to be pink while the brambling is orange. If there is any lingering doubt, the clincher is that bramblings flash a distinctive white rump when in flight and lack the chaffinch’s white tail feathers.

Bramblings move here in autumn from their breeding grounds among the endless conifers and birches of Scandinavia and Siberia, and are particularly mob-handed when they run out of beech mast, their preferred winter food.

Large numbers started turning up on the Yorkshire coast in early October and at Spurn were soon peaking at around 500 to 600 a day, part of a process which saw an estimated 116,000 recorded in one incredible movement on the continent.

At the other end of the Humber from Spurn, the RSPB’s Blacktoft Sands reserve reported an increase on previous winters.

“We usually only get about six records but I reckon this year we have had over 200 birds at least,” reported the reserve’s resident blogger Pete Short. “So it’s certainly a notable year.”

In North Yorkshire, an old country name for the brambling points to another species with which it might be confused – the linnet. In the old North Riding, I have heard bramblings called “French linnets”, although this is odd given that bramblings are associated with boreal forests rather than the French countryside.

Another folksy name is easier to understand. They utter little chuckling noises as they flit from bush to bush while feeding and thus became known as the furze chirper. More obvious is that brambling reflects their association with blackberry bushes, where they habitually roost.

I have never seen bramblings in a huge flock, so I love the following description reported by Victorian ornithologist Robert Gray: “The flock took the form of a column, which must have been at least a quarter of a mile in length by some fifteen yards in breadth. Every slight alteration in the direction of the flight of the birds in the van was copied by all the members of the flock behind, thus giving to the column the appearance of a great winged serpent as it twisted and undulated onward.”

But what were bramblings doing in my garden? I have no beech trees to supply them with mast, although there is a small beech wood not too far away. The likeliest explanation is that I have a couple of birches, which cast a prolific amount of seeds and no doubt made the birds feel they were back in those great boreal forests.