Weather delivers a good run of migrants

The beginning of October can prove either incredibly exciting or very frustrating if you happen to be a birdwatcher. While it is the time of the year when most of our migrants are on the move, the prevailing weather conditions ultimately dictate where and when they might turn up. If the winds are from the west then Norfolk’s east coast is unlikely to turn up anything unusual. If, however, the wind is from the east and there is overnight rain or fog on the coast, then huge numbers of migrants may make landfall, delivering a veritable feast for the birdwatcher.

This autumn has got off to a good start and there have been some good numbers of migrants reported from across the county. Most have been familiar and expected species, like wryneck, yellow-browed warbler and red-backed shrike, but there have been one or two less common species. More of the action has been taking place further north, however, particularly in relation to rarities, and it has been the Northern Isles, Shetland and Orkney that have hosted the best birds so far. Included in these have been a number of American species, transported across the Atlantic within the fast-moving tracks of autumn storms.

October is traditionally the month when many birdwatchers head west, journeying to Cornwall and on to the Isles of Scilly. These small islands provide the best opportunities for catching up with some of the rarest vagrants and they also provide the added benefit of some late season warmth, extending the summer for a few more weeks. For the more hardcore birdwatchers – those seemingly more interested in the number of species they have seen – the autumn migration becomes a bit of game. Should they remain on the mainland, ready to dash to Norfolk or head to Scotland, or should they base themselves on the islands, where a rare bird might only make a fleeting visit before disappearing, never to be seen again?

As someone who is more interested in watching the birds on my local patch or in engaging with a bird within its wider landscape, autumn is a less pressured, more enjoyable affair. I can savour what happens to come my way and if it does come? Well, then it doesn’t matter.

Wonderful Wrynecks

This autumn has seen a larger than usual passage of wrynecks, with good numbers of these smart little birds arriving on the coast over a single weekend. Most were seen at traditional sites, like the dunes at Holme and the short turf of Beeston Bump, but a few turned up further inland, including one at the RSPB’s Strumpshaw Fen reserve.

The wryneck is a member of the woodpecker family, a sister species with an ancient and separate lineage from our other woodpeckers. It was once a familiar breeding species in England, with most English counties holding breeding pairs at the end of the Nineteenth Century. Since then the breeding population has evaporated, with numbers dwindling over the following decades and the species lost as a regular breeder. Very occasional breeding attempts are noted today and the wryneck is now best regarded as a passage visitor, passing through on spring and autumn migration. Unusually for a woodpecker the wryneck is a long-distance migrant, with western populations breeding in northern Europe and wintering in sub-Saharan Africa.

Passage wrynecks seem to like the short turf of garden lawns, a consequence of the ant colonies they support. Spending a lot of time on the ground, wrynecks can be tricky to spot because of their vermiculated plumage: a mix of browns, greys and black. Unlike other woodpeckers wrynecks do not use their tail for support when climbing, nor do they hammer at wood with their bill, preferring instead to chisel and lever away material.

The loss of wrynecks from Britain as a breeding species has been linked by some to a decline in ant populations, but it is more likely to be the result of a wider decline in populations over the western European part of the breeding range. Britain is on the margins of this breeding range and any decline in populations elsewhere is likely to have had an impact here. Your best chance of seeing a wryneck is to visit the coast at this time of the year and to seek out areas of short turf – golf courses are ideal. Watch the weather forecast the evening before and look for a run of easterly winds that may push autumn migrants towards our shores.

Wryneck

In yesterday’s column I touched on the arrival of east coast vagrants, birds that had been drifted to our shores while on their autumn migration south. One of these, the Wryneck, deserves a more detailed piece, not least because of its rather unusual character.

The first thing that strikes you about the Wryneck is its size. As a member of the woodpecker family I’d always expected my first Wryneck to be a substantial creature, similar in size to a Great Spotted Woodpecker. Instead, the small and slender bird that greeted me prompted the involuntary comment ‘it’s tiny!’ In terms of body length the Wryneck is only a little smaller than a Starling but it is of slighter build, a characteristic further emphasised by some of the postures that it adopts. As a child I had a similar response to my first Mole (found dead by the side of the road) and Kingfisher (glimpsed on a local stream); both were significantly smaller than I’d imagined.

With its brown, grey and black vermiculated plumage and its short but pointed bill, the Wryneck doesn’t look like your typical woodpecker either. Unlike other woodpeckers it does not use its tail for support when climbing, nor does it hammer with its bill, preferring instead to chisel away. It can sometimes be seen perching crossways on a branch (again rather unwoodpecker-like) and even its flight bears little resemblance to that of its relatives. Most of the Wrynecks I have seen have been on the ground, either on coastal dunes or the lawns of suburban gardens. In both of these localities the birds will have been foraging, searching the ground for ants.

For me, part of the attraction of the Wryneck is the folklore with which it is associated, even though most of this lore remains firmly rooted elsewhere in Europe. Of particular interest is the name ‘snakebird’, which was used widely across southern England when the bird once bred here in good numbers. This association comes from the defensive display, in which the bird writhes its head around in a strongly reptilian fashion. I have been told that this behaviour is all the more striking when seen at the nest hole, since here the chicks also indulge in the writhing display, occasionally darting out their tongues and all the while uttering a most snake-like hiss. This behaviour, and its effect on nest-robbing children, is wonderfully described in John Clare’s poem ‘The Wryneck’s Nest’.

In the ancient world the Wryneck was ascribed magical powers and associated with various fertility rites. It may have been the bird’s snake-like behaviour that first suggested magical properties, since snakes were strongly associated with fertility. Even now, there is something magical about the Wryneck.

On the move

Early autumn fogs hold the prospect of vagrants from the east. Small migrant birds, setting off from Scandinavia under clear skies, may find themselves drifted west across the North Sea. Here they may encounter a bank of fog or rain, which forces them down on to the East Anglia coast. If the combination and timing of these meteorological conditions happens in a certain way then many hundreds or even thousands of birds may seek the relative security of England’s east coast. This is a truly exciting event for the birdwatcher and an early morning walk among the dunes at Winterton or along the long shingle ridge towards Blakeney Point may yield some stunning birds. The sight of hundreds of Robins or Pied Flycatchers is one not readily forgotten. In with these more familiar migrants may be less commonly encountered species, including various warblers, thrushes and other delights.

Frustration comes when the forecast shows real promise and you have a full day of work ahead, with no prospect of an early morning dash to the coast. The walk out to Blakeney, which is to be recommended, is at least a half-day affair and not something you can squeeze in before work. It is a strange place, an exposed and empty landscape, touched by the hand of past human activities to leave a desolate air. In the clearing mists of early morning, ridges of shingle take on weird shapes and the landscape appears all the more alien. I sometimes feel as if everything else has gone, that human society has disappeared and all that is left are vague echoes of our presence in the form of discards from passing ships and former inhabitants of the point.

The Point at Blakeney has held some nice birds over the last two weeks, with one of my favourites – the Wryneck – reported by visiting birdwatchers. There are some birds that seem ideally suited to a particular place or landscape and the Point is the place that I most strongly associate with the Wryneck. This diminutive member of the woodpecker family was once a regular breeder across much of England but now it is effectively extinct as a breeding species – a real loss.

The arrival of these autumn migrants feels somewhat early this year, no doubt a reflection of the cold autumnal spell felt in the last two weeks of August. I usually associate late September and early October with visits to the coast to watch visible migration in action (the sight of pipits and thrushes passing south at dawn) or to seek out some of our rarer visitors. Even now, the long walk on shingle might be hard work but the rewards are likely to be worth it.