From America all the way to Essex - the secret world of the elusive northern waterthrush

 

Northern waterthrush - jerking of the head

The rare northern waterthrush that has this week been drawing hundreds of birders to an industrial estate at Heybridge in Essex was also a species that fascinated American ornithologist Neltje Blanchan who included reference to it in her 1897 book, Bird Neighbours : an introductory acquaintance with one hundred and fifty birds commonly found in the gardens, meadows, and woods about our homes. Below  is how she describes the elusive species.

Northern Waterthrush 

Also called also : New York water thrush, aquatic wood wagtail or aquatic thrush.

Length: 5 to 6 inches - a trifle smaller than the English house sparrow. 

Male and female: Uniform olive or greyish-brown above. Pale buff line over the eye. Underneath, white tinged with sulphur-yellow, and streaked like a thrush with very dark brown arrow-headed or oblong spots that are also seen underneath wings. 

Range: United States, westward to Rockies and northward through British provinces. Winters from Gulf States southward. 

According to the books we have before us, a warbler; but who, to look at his speckled throat and breast, would ever take him for anything but a diminutive thrush; or, studying him from some distance through the opera-glasses as he runs in and out of  the little waves along the brook or river shore, would not name him a baby sandpiper.  

The rather unsteady motion of his legs, balancing of the tail and sudden jerking of the head suggest an aquatic bird rather than a bird of the woods. 

But to really know either man or beast, you must follow him to his home, and, if you have pluck enough to brave the swamp and the almost impenetrable tangle of undergrowth where the water thrush chooses to nest, there "in the swamp in secluded recesses, a shy and hidden bird is warbling a song".

And this warbled song that the poet, Walt Whitman, so adored gives you your first clue to the proper classification of the bird. 

It has nothing in common with the serene, hymn-like voices of the true thrushes. The bird has no flute-like notes, but an emphatic smacking or chucking kind of warble. 

For a few days only is this song heard about the gardens and roadsides of  our country places. 

Like the Louisiana waterthrush, this bird never ventures near the homes of men after the spring and autumn migrations, but, on the contrary, goes as far away from them as possible, preferably to some mountain region, beside a cool and dashing brook where a party of adventurous young climbers from a summer hotel or the lonely trout fisherman may startle it from its mossy nest on the ground.