WHERES TOM HANKS? STAGECOACH BUS PASSENGERS THOUGHT BLACK-THROATED THRUSH 'TWITCH' WAS FILM CREW SHOOTING SCENES FOR NEW MOVIE!

What's going on? Some passengers thought Hollywood had come to Grimsby

THE rare black-throated thrush that has spent the first part of this month on a college campus in Lincolnshire has now been watched by up to 250 birders

However, it is not the thrush but the birders themselves who who have been the focus of the steady stream of passing road traffic.


Motorists and their passengers, plus pedestrians and cyclists, have been intrigued by all the commotion - not to mention the sight of so many tripod-mounted optics.


On the passing Stagecoach buses, passengers have craned their necks both to view the drama and to try to figure out what was going on.

Anyone for the rare bird? The Stagecoach pulls up outside the institute

One, Marie Hawkins, of Cleethorpes, told The Wryneck: “We all thought some sort of a movie was being made - one that involved a large number of film crew.


“We were looking out for Hugh Grant, Tom Hanks, Meryl Streep or someone famous.

Tom Hanks - could he be in Grimsby?

“It was only later that someone told me, it was twitchers who had spotted a rare kind of thrush.


“You wouldn’t think so many people would congregate just to look at a bird.


“But good luck to them. I think it’s quite exciting. In a strange way, it’s put Grimsby and the institute on the map - or at least on the birdspotting map.”


Meanwhile, management - plus staff and students - at the institute have earned plaudits for being so accommodating to the influx of visitors.


On Tuesday, there was a report that security staff had asked birders to “vacate” the campus - partly because their tripods might be damaging the turf and partly because the presence of so many cameras might put the privacy of staff and students at risk.


But it was obvious the birders were only interested in the bird - and that they were behaving responsibly.

Star appeal - the black-throated thrush

Subsequently, the institute put out a message on social media - one that expressed delight, albeit bemused, that its campus was being graced by such a rare and impressive bird


Not only that but it went on to emphasise that the ornithologists watching the black-throated thrush - the first time the species has been recorded in Lincolnshire - were very welcome.


Showbiz note: None of the named celebrities (nor Colin Firth, Nicole Kidman, Tom Cruise  and Scarlett Johansson) is known ever to have visited Grimsby or the institute, though Tom Hanks was once in Lincoln during the making of  The Da Vinci Code and Meryl Streep played a Lincolnshire-born politician in The Iron Lady. According to a spokesperson, the most famous (not counting the thrush) visitor to have looked in at  the institute in recent times (last December) was prime minister Boris Johnson during his General Election campaign.

* Grimsby's other most famous rarity -  American robin. Read all about it (and its sad demise) in A Birdwatching Guide to The Lincolnshire Coast (price £2 including postage)
https://bit.ly/39g03Qn