I had dreamed of a Waxwing; I had hoped for a Blackcap. But I was more than pleased that my surprise visitor to the garden this weekend was Mavis!
Here she is, looking very neatly turned out indeed. Note how the spots are really like chevrons, and how the upper breast has got a subtle but distinctive yellow wash to it, unlike the round spots and cold white background on the bulkier Mistle Thrush.
Quite why Chaucer should call the Song Thrush 'Mavis' I'm afraid I don't know (but am happy to be told!). But of course what is well known is the calamitous decline in numbers over the last 25 years or so. The 2010 State of the UK Birds report shows that for every Song Thrush out there in 1970, there is just one now.
This isn't one of those birds like your White-tailed Eagles or Avocets which are so rare that nature reserves can turn their fortunes around. No, this is a creature of the wider countryside, relying on the overall health of environment to maintain its populations.
And as hedges have been lost, grasslands ploughed, and many arable farms have become more intensively managed*, so the Song Thrush has struggled to find enough food to raise enough chicks. (*This is no finger-wagging at farmers - these changes to the countryside come from market forces and political incentives, and all of us as consumers and voters are bound up in the problem).
What is significant for us as gardeners is that today a huge proportion of the remaining Song Thrushes are found in gardens. What we collectively do can help make or break them.
This weekend, it was some spilt sunflower seed that was helping the one in my garden. But the key is to provide all their Home Needs at all seasons. They need moist soil, leaf litter, mulches, and lawns that haven't seen chemicals so they can find enough worms and beetles. And they need dense shrubberies and trees where they can find berries, nest sites, song perches and caterpillars.
And among the many rewards you'll get? Daily serenading by surely one of the finest singers out there.
If you want to drop by my RSPB wildlife gardening blog, it is updated every Friday, and I'd love to see you there - www.rspb.org.uk/community/blogs/hfw
Sounds a busy garden, Carol. To get a Grey Wagtail is very unusual and as you say probably hunger overcoming caution, particularly given all the cold weather.
I have also had a solitary song-thrush for the last few days. I am an avid bird fan and feed them three times daily (on 3 bird tables) all year round. I feel very lucky to have such a wonderful bird in my garden. I also have a male black-cap (last year I had the female too) about 30 sparrows and dunnocks mixed, coal tits, blue tits, robins, blackbirds and one little jenny-wren. This week there was also one female grey-wagtail. Very delicate and dainty with a little silver-grey 'beret' on and a breast the colour of clotted cream. She is timid but must be hungry to come to my bird tables I think. All this in a suburbun garden on an estate. Long may it continue.
Carol (Paignton, Devon)
Their song is not so pleasant when there are two of them squabbling in a holly tree (I presumed that was what was going on). It sounded more like bird murder and was definitely not a pleasing sound, I'm not sure if it can be classed as a song at all.
Build it and they will come.
Honoured indeed! I'm just grateful that Mistle Thrushes sings so powerfully that they can be heard 2km away. That's as close as I have come in my garden - just the distant sound of one a long way off!
I had another good look today and then went onto the RSPB web site and listened to both of their songs, we definitely have a Mistle thrush. I feel honoured rather than disappointed now.