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| White's Thrush - undulating flight reminiscent of a Green Woodpecker |
Warwickshire ornithologist Robert F.Tomes was not the birder who discovered the White's Thrush that turned up near his home one winter's day in 1859. However, it was he who was able to confirm the identification having examined the corpse after the hapless bird had been shot. This is part of his account which first appeared in an edition , later that year, of The Ibis, quarterly journal of the British Ornithologists' Union.
The village of Welford, five miles west of Stratford-on-Avon, where the specimen was obtained, is situated in a bend of the Avon, and that the soil is a rich alluvium.
Its position is highly favourable for the growth of timber and fruit trees, and it is well shrouded in orchards and small enclosures, fringed with their hedgerows and ivy-clad elms, affording a favourite haunt for many of the smaller birds, with a good supply of cherries and other fruits in the summer months and of berries through the autumn and winter seasons.
From a cherry orchard, a few miles down stream, I obtained, a few years since, a specimen of the Rose-coloured Pastor, and Starlings and thrushes abound.
Of insect-feeders, there is an equally good supply; and I have had more than one opportunity of inspecting the nesting of the Lesser Spotted Woodpecker.
In a small grass enclosure immediately adjoining the village and thickly surrounded by elms, a friend of mine observed a bird rise from a dry leafy ditch.
At the first glance, it was mistaken for a Woodcock but it was soon recognised as a variety of thrush.
This happened on the 6th of January, and, on hearing the account, I stimulated a further search, but without effect until the 23rd of that month when the bird was again flushed from the same enclosure, and, as before, from the bottom of a dry ditch amongst dead leaves.
Again on the 26th, it rose from the same ditch, and within a few yards of the same spot.
On each occasion it was busied in turning over the dead leaves from beneath which it appears to have taken its food.
Although Blackbirds, Song Thrushes and Mistle Thrushes were abundant and seen at the same time feeding on the ivy and hawthorn berries, the present bird was always observed to resort only to the trees or hedges when disturbed, and then merely as a place of rest, remaining for some time perched in an upright position in one spot, without noticing the berries or the species feeding on them.
Its flight, when roused from its feeding, was very undulating, like that of the Green Woodpecker, and low, often settling on the ground, and only making choice of a tree when it happened to pass under one into which it rose almost vertically.
As far as its habits could be ascertained from these short opportunities of observation, it would appear to be almost entirely a ground feeder.
Edward Blyth says of the allied Indian species, Oreocincla dauma, that it is generally met with amongst bamboos, in which situation the ground, rather than the canes, would very likely be the attraction.
I have been thus particular in the description of the locality in which the bird appeared on account of the interval which
occurred between its first and second appearance, for it must be supposed that it was a suitable one or it would not have again
returned to it after an absence of more than a fortnight.
* Named after the naturalist, the Rev Gilbert White, the species breeds in East Asia and Siberia, migrating to South-east Asia for winter. It is only a rare vagrant to Western Europe.
** Photo: JJ Harrison via Wikimedia Commons
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