Not the Bird We Were Looking For

Male yellowhammer on hedgerow

Male yellowhammer – photo by Klg76, licence free on Pixabbay.com

This post begins with a note of caution: if a friend asks you to go on a ‘twitch’ (birder term for looking for a locally scare bird that’s been reported in the area) to a woodland that neither of you know at all – it’s probably best to say “No!” However, it was an adventure and, although we didn’t hear the bird we’d been told was there, I did hear and see my first-ever yellowhammer as we were driving home, so it was a good trip overall!

After struggling through thigh-high grasses and thistles and bending double under extremely low branches, we spent about 20 minutes sitting in a dark, dead, dense and deserted woodland, being mozzie bothered and bitten. We presumed it was going to be a wild goose chase before we set out, so we gave up quickly, had a bit of a wander to find a ‘pool’ (dank, green and algae-clogged) and returned post haste to the car.

Just a couple of minutes into the homeward journey, windows fortunately open, we heard an unmistakeable song and pulled onto a handy farm track. At first, we could only hear the yellowhammer, but eventually found it perched high on a telegraph pole, its hurried “Little bit of bread and no cheese” song echoing across farm fields and road. Sometimes, the yellowhammer omits the “no cheese” notes, and this bird was alternating between the two requests. Although distant, its vibrant yellow plumage was clear to see through binoculars, and the bird gave us a few minutes of song before disappearing into the trees – alas, too quickly for a photograph.

It is pleasing to know that these striking buntings are still living in the farmland around Halewood; however, it was sad to see the numerous housing developments in various stages of completion right on the edge of this land, no doubt pushing the wildlife into smaller and smaller suitable patches of habitat and setting them in competition with each other for scarcer and scarcer resources – food, water, shelter, breeding territories.

Much of their decline is due to the changes in farmland management practices, e.g., ploughing in the autumn instead of in the spring, and so not leaving stubble on the fields through the winter. John Lewis-Stempel’s The Running Hare (2016) well sets out the plight of this bird and the other species that rely on farmland for survival. See also the RSPB’s website: https://www.rspb.org.uk/our-work/conservation/conservation-and-sustainability/farming/advice/helping-species/yellowhammer/.

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