Ovenbird – Trenowath, St Marys, Isles of Scilly, 25^th October 2004

And there, unobtrusively walking about amongst the pine needle and dead bracken litter, was this stonker!

Wow, wow and triple wow! It was the day after the resounding success of my twitch for cream-coloured courser with Elizabeth (the erstwhile love of my life, with whom I was briefly(?) reunited in the noughties). We were in the throes of starting the second phase of our idyllic exploration of the Scillies (eh?) with a day out on St. Agnes. I’d opted for St. Agnes for our ‘day’ out, as it was my favourite island, and offered the option of the wonderful Turks Head (as Elizabeth had a proposal to work on).

Suddenly, as we sorted out the option of her working on her proposal in the back room of the Turks Head (basically I arranged for the bar man to keep her supplied with hot chocolates with brandy in them), the pager went ballistic with the stunning news of an Ovenbird back on St. Mary's from whence we had just come.....!!!!!!!!!

I rushed down to the quay and found various other birders already there, in various states of panic. I was already philosophical about it in advance of any potential disappointment. All the same, the wait for the boat seemed interminable; I returned to make sure Elizabeth was alright during the wait. However, the boat did finally arrive after some 30 minutes, and a reasonably full boatload made its way back to St. Mary’s. The chattering was of an excited variety, and plans were being made for transport up to Trenowarth.

Once at the St. Mary’s harbour wall we quickly disembarked, and as there was a mini-bus waiting nearby, I walked over to it. I was aware that it had probably been pre-booked by birders, but as most were already yomping down the quay and into Hugh Town, I thought it was worth a try. My hunch paid off, as quickly six other birders appeared, and although the driver said he could take six, and I was the odd one out, space was found for me, squatting in the footwell...... .

So. we were soon journeying up through Hugh Town, and past the desperate straggle of birders, and we were quickly and efficiently dropped at the bulb farm, and all for a pound! From the point at which we were deposited, we had a short walk along muddy tracks through the pine shelterbelts to the scene of the twitch. Here there was a group of c.45 birders looking along a narrow path through the bracken towards another, smaller, group of birders. I found a venue, but the whole scenario looked and sounded distinctly unpromising. Apparently three people had seen the bird, one of whom was Will Wagstaffe, who had been asked by the couple who had found it to check it out…… . Apparently, it had walked seaward across the path in front of them, and then once Will had joined them, it had walked back landward across the path. The chances of it doing this again were minimal, and even if it did so, the chances of seeing it were very, very minimal, giving the viewing conditions. As such, the atmosphere of the twitch wasn’t really one of excited anticipation, rather it was one of disappointed realisation.

A fantastic photograph of the scenes early on during the Ovenbird twitch, with yours truly visible in the bright blue Berghaus jacket below the left-hand person standing in the pine tree, Trenowarth, St. Mary's, Scilly, October 2004 (photograph credited to unknown).

After some while, in response, Dick Filby and Will Wagstaffe, plus A. N. Other, organised themselves into a controlled flushing team, and walked ‘the bird’ up towards the path through the bracken ............. with no effect. However, Dick Filby was annoyed by the subsequent rising noise from the main gallery, and asserted that they had possibly got something in the scrub on the opposite side of the track, and suggested we keep quiet. However, nothing came of this, and with that, some birders began to drift away. As the twitch broke up, I (and others) considered it legitimate to go looking. I opted to investigate the aforementioned scrub rather than stand around forlornly, as most others did. By walking a short distance, I was easily able to get on the seaward side of the pine shelterbelt, and then into it, along a very minor ‘desire line’ and towards the same scrub area. This area looked really good, to the extent that it evoked memories of Boy Scout Wood, High Island, Texas, where I had last seen ovenbird. I eventually had a fleeting glimpse of what I considered to be a likely suspect, all the more so after I eventually saw the bird in this precise location......... .

I spent some time checking out this area, and whilst doing so I was conscious that I was possibly annoying the still assembled ranks of birders in the gallery I could see through the scrub. I was particularly aware of this when Elizabeth ‘phoned. She was very disappointed on my behalf when she heard that I had failed on my mission, and consoled me beautifully, although I was still phlegmatic....... .

No sooner had we ended our conversation that a shout went up from near to where the other gallery had been, and I and everyone else stampeded towards this point. I arrived in good time and was able to join the people who had re-located the bird and get their directions first hand. It had appeared in front of them on another path through the young pines, and promptly walked into the scrub. Despite the crashing arrival of some 50 birders in its vicinity, it didn’t immediately flush, although it was difficult to believe that it was still around.

Suddenly though, it did appear, when it flew up onto some low branches of the young pines, where it perched in full view for a few seconds. I got on it before it then flew away from its audience, and quickly back down into the cover of the young pines and bracken under-storey. This was to prove an oft-repeated pattern, and each time the gallery quickly, and relatively quietly, dispersed and reassembled around the bird in any location from which it might be visible. As a result, I, and everyone else had spates of nervous anticipation as we waited for the bird to be re-located and tried to decide from where best to try to see the bird. Given the cover, and the dense ground cover, it was very difficult to see as it walked around unobtrusively amongst the bracken and bramble. Each time the gallery re-assembled in an approximation of a circle, some c.50m in diameter, and sometimes much less, as quietly as possible given the dead branches and bracken. The bird was generally surprisingly unflustered by all of this, and again generally the crowds remained reasonably calm. Successively, then I got better and better views, on two occasions with just a very few metres of me. This happened on a least five or six occasions, and typically each time I was able to get reasonably good views under very difficult viewing conditions before the bird decided to move on. Most memorably, on one occasion it walked towards me to within 2 – 3m and I was able to get others onto it as it moved backwards and forwards behind the trunk of a small pine. And then, best of all, in similar circumstances, I was, with some considerable difficulty, able to get Mushtaq Ahmed on it as it walked towards us where we were lying amongst the bracken in front of the gallery. This was indicative of just how difficult it was to see the bird, as here was a very experienced birder, lying within a metre of me, and despite all my efforts and what I thought were good directions, he really struggled to get on it. Too often, the temptation was be looking too far way, whilst it walked around, unconcernedly, in the foreground. As a result, I suggested to Elizabeth when she rang that it wouldn’t be worth coming up to see it as I thought it would be too difficult for her to see. This was something I regretted, as she could have seen it, and I now she regretted it too.

No, I can't see it either (but it gives an idea of what we were contending with.

The Ovenbird blended in to its’ surroundings incredibly well, due to the combination of the subdued light and its’ unobtrusive behaviour and subtle plumage. Earlier on in the twitch a pipit spp. had flown over the galleries calling and it had landed in the top of a small pine nearby. This was, on the basis of the call, a tree pipit, I thought, although coincidentally or not there was a small olive-backed pipit twitch soon after the ovenbird twitch first broke up. This is mentioned in that this was perhaps the most obviously analogy with the ovenbird; certainly, this ovenbird was reminiscent of the olive-backed pipit I had seen in Holkham Pines many years ago in the way it grovelled around.

This analogy is based on not just the general plumage, but also its behaviour. It was possibly rock pipit in size, although it had a shorter tail. Its stance was similar too, although it was more horizontal in its carriage. The upperparts were overall a greeny olive-brown, and the under-parts a cold off-white with heavy broad streaks on the upper breast fading out on the flanks. The head pattern was very distinctive, with a pale and wide eye-ring surrounding a large dark eye, a hint of a supercilium, and a thin dark brown lateral crown stripe picking out an indistinct orangey-brown central crown stripe. The sub-moustachial stripe was the same off-white colour as the breast, and the chin and throat were unmarked. The bill was surprisingly heavy – Dunnock-like, and was a browny-grey, with a paler pinkish base, particularly to the lower mandible. The legs were pinkish. It was predominately seen on the ground, but was also seen in flight, when again the pipit analogy was reasonable. It was not definitely heard to call.

All in all, a f***ing magic bird, and a magic twitch, especially following on from the successes of the cream-coloured courser twitch. Indeed, within half an hour of leaving the scene of the ovenbird twitch, having just had my best views when it perched up in full view in my secret prime spot, in a way reminiscent of the hermit thrush, I was again watching the cream-coloured courser. Where else could I do this but the Scillies? It was just a shame that both birds both died soon afterwards.

Ovenbird, Trenowarth, St. Mary's, Scilly, October 2004 (photograph credited to Steve Nuttall).