No sign of swifts over London but the Red Arrows did fly past this morning and I glimpsed a woodpecker on Wimbledon Common. When I was a child thrushes were common but I’ve only just realised they are rarer these days.
They are on the RSPB red list because –
- Species is globally threatened.
- Historical population decline in UK during 1800–1995.
- Severe (at least 50%) decline in UK breeding population over last 25 years, or longer-term period (the entire period used for assessments since the first BoCC review, starting in 1969).
- Severe (at least 50%) contraction of UK breeding range over last 25 years, or the longer-term period.
The two sorts of thrush that are resident in the UK are the song thrush, described by the RSPB as “a familiar and popular garden songbird whose numbers have declined markedly on farmland and in towns and cities. It’s smaller and browner than a mistle thrush with smaller spotting. Its habit of repeating song phrases distinguish it from singing blackbirds. It likes to eat snails which it breaks into by smashing them against a stone with a flick of the head”.
Its much larger cousin is the mistle thrush , so called because they eat mistletoe berries. “A pale, black-spotted thrush – large, aggressive and powerful. It stands boldly upright and bounds across the ground. In flight, it has long wings and its tail has whitish edges. It is most likely to be noticed perched high at the top of a tree, singing its fluty song or giving its rattling call in flight.“
Robert saw this one in the small park on the way to the river and took a photograph. That’s when I realised I hadn’t seen any thrushes for a while. Meanwhile the wigwams on Wimbledon Common are getting more elaborate and look like art installations.
Having spent much of VE+75 trying to video a busy Madam Blackbird and her beak-fulls of twigs, I am bowled over by Robert’s thrush. My common-as-anything bird was gorgeous but unpredictable. But maybe I lack Robert’s swiftness.