In a Cheshire Garden: Natural History Notes

by Geoffrey Egerton-Warburton

They say that there is in Switzerland a law which forbids the shooting of any bird without a licence. If some such law could be enforced here, rare birds that seek hospitality among us would no longer be at the mercy of every idle lout who happens to have a gun. And is it impossible that children might be taught to find pleasure in watching, and not, as seems generally the case now, in destroying life?

We often have a pair of missel-thrushes ("shercocks" in Cheshire) nesting here. Generally they build in a tree at some distance away, where they make their presence known by noisy attacks on other birds; but once they had their nest in a Scotch fir close to the house, and then they were so quiet as almost to escape notice altogether.

There were two nests in the old churchyard this year (1912). One in a Spanish Chestnut was about thirty feet from the ground, in the middle of a clump of little shoots that grew straight up on the top side of a thick branch. This branch overhangs a patch of grass running close to the boundary wall and on this green boys were playing football with much shouting and noise every evening. The nest stood out plainly to be seen, and for a week before they flew (which they did on April 20th) you could easily count all four young ones. The other nest was in a yew, under which there is a seat in summer, and was simply set on the top of one of the lowest spreading boughs without any attempt at concealment. It was at the end of the bough and not six feet from the ground, within easy reach of anyone. It could, however, only be seen when you were actually under the tree and probably would never have been noticed at all but for the behaviour of the birds themselves. After the eggs were hatched they attacked everybody who went under or even near the tree, swooping down suddenly from you didn't know where and almost dashing into your face, indeed they would often hit your hat. I am glad to say this display of courage was not wasted, for the young birds safely flew on May 17th.

Missel-thrush is said to be short for mistletoe-thrush, and to mark the singular taste of the bird for mistletoe berries. Mistletoe is scarce with us, but they do appear to depend more upon berries of every kind than either throstles or blackbirds, and one year I remember when the yews bore an extraordinary crop of berries, the trees were quite alive with the missel-thrushes that came to eat them. I would say, by the way, that a great part of the holly berries are sometimes left untouched by birds, and I have seen trees in summer quite red with the berries of the previous year.

One or two missel-thrushes generally come to the food-stand in winter and show themselves expert in getting fat from the supposed sparrow-proof receptacles.

Though missel-thrushes are common their song is not familiar. It has been described as much better than a throstle's; I do not know if that is the general opinion. It certainly is simpler without the same repetition, and it has seemed to me more mellow, more like a blackbird's when I have heard it, but that is not often. Throstles will sometimes sing continuously all the winter through, and early in the year I have listened most carefully to catch the notes of their bigger brothers, but only very seldom with success. They have, however, an autumn song which I first noticed at the end of September a good many years ago. I became aware one day of a bird's song that seemed to be sometimes the note of a blackbird, sometimes of a throstle. After listening for several days I came to the conclusion that it must have been one of the many starlings that were singing everywhere, one that had learnt more or less successfully to imitate a throstle. However, I never could make sure, for I never could catch sight of the singer, he would hide himself in a holly or a yew, and would at once stop singing if I went near. At last, one day I heard him at the top of a sycamore which was nearly bare of leaves, and managed to bring a glass to bear on him; even then his body was hidden by a bough and his head was all that I could see, but the head was plainly that of a thrush. While I watched I could distinctly see him turn his eye down on me, and he was off in an instant; but though I only got a glimpse as he flew away, there was no mistaking the flight of a missel-thrush. It seemed curious to me at the time that he should be singing at all then, and that he should be so shy about it.

Song-thrushes, or throstles as they are called in Cheshire, are always plentiful, but not always to the same extent. They were, for instance, very much thinned in numbers by the hard winter of 1895, but in a couple of years they abounded again, and I heard people complain of their night's rest being spoilt, there were so many and they sang so early and so loud. From April to June they sing almost incessantly, from earliest light until quite dark. They begin at three in the morning, or even earlier, and sing their loudest for about an hour; then there seems somewhat of a lull, but they soon start again in full chorus, and go on singing more or less throughout the day, sometimes until past nine at night. In 1905, on the longest day of the year, I woke at 2-30 a.m. to hear a throstle in full song just outside my window, and at 9-30 p.m. a throstle, almost certainly the same bird, was singing in the same place. I have often wondered how, with so much time devoted to musical exercises, they manage to find enough for the more important business of feeding themselves and their hungry broods.

A blackbird's song is, I think, always a love song, but mere exuberance of spirits will make a throstle sing. I have seen one sing snatches of his song whilst hunting for worms on the grass, as though he were too full of joyousness to contain himself, and a couple of them will sing at one another during intervals of quarrelling on the ground. There seems at all times more rivalry and contention between throstles throughout the whole season, and less of the spirit of camaraderie that one so often sees with blackbirds, at least when once they have settled the momentous question of pairing.

Within the bounds of general similarity much variety can be heard in the songs of throstles; no two seem to be exactly alike, and some birds are far better singers, have a much clearer, more musical note than others.

In 1907, and again in 1909, I noticed that throstles were in full song everywhere on July 15th, just as though it had been the middle of May.