In this Limbo-Lockdown life we are living, we
come to appreciate birds rather more – many come to see you and you do not need
to make a huge or perilous effort to see them. So, I celebrate a clutch of
British birds, not always the prettiest but easily remembered and much cherished.
Of course, birds get a mixed press, they are unpredictable and coolly
independent as Hitchcock reminded us in his 1963 The Birds (see clip
below) and others will shudder at the memory of the pigeon lady of Central
Park, NYC, in 1992’s Home Alone 2.
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| A black-billed magpie in flight |
I start with the Magpie as there are
many here in Folkestone and, unlike many other breeds, its population is
growing. I am not sure why, but lack of predators and protective laws must play
a part. A member of the crow family, it is said to be a most intelligent bird,
which can recognize itself in a mirror and use casual items as a tool. It is
attracted to shiny objects and has a reputation as an aggressor and a thief –
most delightfully captured in Rossini’s opera The Thieving Magpie (La
Gazza Ladra), whose overture is a perennial concert “lollipop”.
Another breed of bird which is plentiful (maybe
over-plentiful) here in Folkestone is the Seagull. They roost and nest
in every spot they can find, usually high up on roofs and chimneys and they
make plenty of noise, an unmelodic squawking. They swoop about and will quickly
pinch a neglected sandwich when not dive-bombing you or your car with
unpleasant bird-lime. They are not lovable birds with their beady eyes,
surprising bulk and insolent manner, but they are an indispensable part of
coastal living and we must live-and-let-live in the prescribed generous fashion.
Personally, they opened a door for me. In the
early 1960s I read The Herring Gull’s World by Niko Tinbergen, a
masterly description of a gull’s habitat and life-style. He was a father of the
modern science of ethology and inspired me to build up at least a superficial
knowledge of animal organization and its evolution into human traits. This led me
to read the splendid books by the American dramatist and scientific populariser
Robert Ardrey, notably African Genesis and The Territorial Imperative,
both fascinating reads, and to read Nobel laureate Konrad Lorenz’s On
Aggression even though many of both’s assumptions have since been
challenged. So, the seagull flies further than expected.
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| Seagulls loudly making themselves at home |
I move on to the somewhat unloved Starlings,
a very common garden bird but drastically declining nationally. I remember
starlings in our Scottish garden, chasing blue-tits, thrushes and blackbirds
away from the feeder, greedily gorging themselves. At a distance they look
black but in fact they have a purply- green sheen. Starlings are most famous for their
spectacular “murmurations”, huge flocking legions near their roosts – often
5,000 birds and occasionally 30,000, a sight to behold.
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| A UK starling murmuration |
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| The common Starling |
When I lived in the Cotswolds, a regular
visitor to our garden was the colourful Great Spotted Woodpecker,
clicking her beak on the bark of trees searching for insects. Further afield,
visits to the Hebridean island of Mull would include a short trip to Staffa,
home of Fingal’s Cave, inspiration of Mendelssohn. Staffa hosts a colony of Puffins,
those jaunty little birds who delight by their tameness.
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| Great Spotted Woodpecker |
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| The sociable Puffin |
My final British bird is altogether more formidable.
The migratory Osprey or sea-eagle had become extinct in southern Britain in the
19th century and extinct in Scotland in 1916. It was reintroduced
with I pair in 1954, at Loch Garten in Spey-side, but by 1976 there were only
14 pairs, achieving a kind of break-through by 2001 to reach 158 pairs. There
are few more thrilling bird-watching sights than an osprey dive-bombing into a
lake catching a fish in its talons, (see below).
To conclude, common in the Mediterranean, but
rarely seen in Britain, is the Hoopoe. This beautifully crested bird
greatly attracted our dear Cotswolds friend Philomena de Hoghton who was our
first house-guest when we moved to Athens. She delighted in the hoop-hoop song
of this proud little fellow. Happy memories!
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| Th splendid Hoopoe |
SMD,
5.09.20
Text copyright © Sidney Donald 2020
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