Hello & possible Savi's Warbler

Hi Everyone,

I've recently moved to Dodworth in Barnsley, and have a beautiful little garden that seems to attract a lot of bird life, which has now got me interested in watching them and finding out more about the visitors I get each day.

90% of what I seem to get in the garden is sparrows and dunnocks, but I also get pigeons, blackbirds, goldfinch's, blue tits and Jays. However, about a week ago I spotted this little fella...

Which looks to my (very) inexperienced eye to be a Savi's Warbler, but I wanted to get the take of the experts on here. Have I got that right, or am I off the mark?

  • Awww, and there was me getting excited that I spotted something rare.

    This bird spotting lark (pun absolutely intended) is not easy, is it?

    I've been using the RSPB images to try and identify things, but of course those don't show young birds, or even necessarily male and female variants. Does anyone have any tips on how to work better identify the birds I'm seeing?
  • Use a decent bird book, such as the "Collins Bird Guide"
  • Thanks for that Richard B. Does that book include reference to the different variants of each bird i.e. male, female, young etc, as that seems to catch me out a lot?
  • If you are not planning on birding in Europe I'd strongly recommend Britain's Birds. It's a photographic guide but very comprehensive and shows birds in a variety of plumages and gender variation. Great value for money too. If you do buy it make sure you get the second edition which is just out.

  • Hi

    the RSPB Pocket guide to British Birds is small cheap and only has about 200 species :)

    AND it has juvenile Starling :)

    S
  • That does look good Tony, I think it will soon be joining the collection .
  • Thanks Tony. I've ordered one of those.
  • Hi Tony,

    I received the book, and it's fabulous!

    I do have a question though. I'm not sure how I would actually go about finding a bird I don't recognise with that book. In the case of the starling, without flicking through every single page in the book I'm not sure how I would have found it. So does anyone have any advice on how to tackle that problem?
  • I think a lot of it is down to experience and getting to know the general shape, size and behaviour of birds as well as location. You get a sense of the type of bird you are looking at even if you can't immediately identify it.

    In my edition of the book there's a set of thumbnails at the front which should enable you to home in fairly quickly to the group of species that you have seen. You wouldn't need to flip though pages of ducks, waders, sea birds etc if you are looking at a small perching bird.

    Glad you like the book although it's not the sort of thing you would take into the field, it's more of a reference book if , for example, you've taken a photo of an unknown bird.  For instance, if you'd looked up Savi's Warbler you would have rapidly realised there's no way a bird like that would have come to a garden feeder.

    If you use a smartphone there's a free app that you might like to try called Merlin Bird ID by Cornell Lab. This is available for both Android and Apple phones. Although it was originally developed for the American market you can download separately a database of bird species for Britain and Europe. One of its features is that there's an interactive Bird ID which takes you through various questions and comes up with one or more suggestions. None of these apps are foolproof but worth giving it a go. Good photos of birds and you can play songs and calls as well.