Harry finds his bird

(Wood Warbler, Croft Hill, Leicestershire, April 2006
image copyright Carl Baggott)

with a little assistance from Adey Baker and Carl Baggott

Wood Warbler has never been a common bird here in Leicestershire and in recent years reports have, quite literally, been down to single figures.

Carl Baggott and I were, thus, very pleased to find one on one of our regular local patches, Croft Hill, on Saturday April 22nd. A couple of years ago we found a Pied Flycatcher, another quite rare county bird, in the same area but we lost track of it almost straight away! Determined not to do the same again we kept up with the Wood Warbler as much as we could and soon realised that it was ringed. Not just a metal ring but three colour rings, as well - orange above the metal ring on the left leg and white over blue on the right leg.

A quick check on the internet at lunchtime provided no clues to its origins, so Carl emailed the BTO for any info that they had.

The bird was re-located later and watched until at least 18:00. Although it had given brief snatches of song earlier in the day, it spent most of its time actively feeding and it was assumed that it was on a 're-fueling' stop-over and would be gone by next day, which proved to be true.

We thought the bird may have been ringed in Europe somewhere but before any info came back from the BTO, Carl received an email this evening from Harry Scott who had seen a photo of the bird that Carl had uploaded to Surfbirds and recognised it as one of 'his' birds!

It was ringed as an adult at Dinnet Oak Wood (just west of Aboyne, on the banks of the River Dee, c. 30 miles west of Aberdeen, Scotland) on 31/05/05. Only three Wood Warblers were colour-ringed at the study site so, as you can imagine, Harry has described it as an amazing result!

Let's hope the bird in question finds its way back to the banks of the Dee after its brief sojourn at the 'Centre of Ancient Albion' (to quote one website!) in SW Leicestershire.

Click here for lots more images of Wood Warblers at surfbirds