Wheatear

“ The Wheatear has by this time delighted many a superstitious yokel who has caught his first glimpse of it sitting on a grassy tuft, or on a low spray of gorse or juniper, or depressed him sorely if he has come upon it for the first time when seen perched on a stone. But all three are birds which are with us long before the real Spring is come. With the missel-thrush on the elm-bole, the song-thrush in the copses, the blackbird calling from the evergreens, it does not follow, alas! that, as in the fairy-tale, the north wind has become a feeble old man and the east wind a silly old wife. ”

“ In two localities with which I am familiar, and know every path, I never saw a wheatear. I heard of them occasionally as passing over, but they were not birds of the district. In Sussex, on the contrary, the wheatear is as regularly seen as the blackbird; and in the spring and summer you cannot go a walk without finding them. They change their ground three times: first on arrival, they feed in the gardens and arable fields; next, they go up on the hills; lastly, they return to the coast, and frequent the extreme edge of the cliffs and the land by the shore. Every bird has its different manner ”

“ It was very beautiful in its delicate shape and pale harmonious colouring, resting on the golden-green mossy turf. And it was a male, undoubtedly the mate of the wheatear I had seen at the spot, and its little mate, not knowing what death is, had probably been keeping watch near it, wondering at its strange stillness and greatly fearing for its safety when I came that way, and passed by without seeing it. ”

“ The wheatears seem to drop out of the night, and to be showered down on the ground in the morning. A white bar on the tail renders them conspicuous, for at that time much of the surface of the earth is bare and dark. Naturally birds of the wildest and most open country, they yet show no dread, but approach the houses closely. They are local in their habits, or perhaps follow a broad but well-defined route of migration; so that while common in one place, they are rare in others. In two localities with which I am familiar, and know every path, I never saw a wheatear. ”

“ A wheatear flying from out of some stones attracts our notice; and here is a nest made of grass and rabbit’s fur, containing six pale blue eggs, not unlike the American blue-birds. This wheatear is called stonechat in America, though it must not be confounded with the English stonechat which is a different species.
We now reach the moors and are soon up to the knees in heather. Bird life here is very numerous. Lapwing plovers fly over our heads, crying “pewit, pewit” in a plaintive note; long-billed curlews are screaming loudly ”

“ The nest is constantly placed under ground; the bird takes advantage of the hole of some other animal, or the shelter of a clod in a fallow-field or a recess beneath a rock. A large amount of soft material is therein collected, and on them from 5 to 8 pale blue eggs are laid.
The wheatear has a very wide range throughout the Old World, extending in summer far within the Arctic Circle, from Norway to the Lena and Yana valleys, while it winters in Africa beyond the Equator and in India. But it also breeds regularly in Greenland and some parts of North America. ”

“ The wheatear, I should say, always hops, and, by so doing, always give me something of a surprise, for there is that in his appearance which does not suggest hopping, but rather that he would run over the ground like a wagtail. ”

“ The Wheatear is a common bird. On the mountains and headlands and islands, as well as in some spots along the lower coast, the shrill highly pitched "ece" or "ees," followed by several hard "tacs" or "tecs," was a familiar sound as the pair of Wheatears, accompanied by their full-grown brood, flitted on before me. The only birds which enlivened the dry, stony, barren (the season had been unusually dry) top of Carn Fadryn were a family of Wheatears. I only saw the Whinchat twice—once at Abersoch, and once in a low pass among the hills near Nauhoran. Mr. Coward has seen a few near Abersoch. ”

“ The common alarm-note resembles the sound made in breaking stones with a hammer, and as it utters that note from the top of the heap which haply covers the bones of one who perished by the storm, or his own hand, popular fancy has not unnaturally associated the Wheatear with the superstition that belongs to the place of graves. Beneath that heap of stones, or in some neighbouring fallow, its nest may be discovered, formed of moss and dried grass, lined with hair, feathers, or wool, and containing five or six eggs of a delicate bluish white. ”

“ The male is light-grey, the wing-quills and coverts are black, the breast is brown with an orange tinge, and the under parts brown and white. The wheatear is esteemed as a table delicacy when the birds are well-nourished. ”

“ To a variety of climates it is able to adapt itself: the vast area it inhabits includes almost the whole continent of Europe, from the hot south to the furthermost north; and westwards its range extends to Iceland, Greenland, and Labrador. But cultivation it cannot tolerate: when the plough comes the wheatear vanishes. ”

“ Of old the best wheatear country was bove Rottingdean; but the South Down shepherds no longer have the wheatear money that used to add so appreciably to their wages in the summer months. A combination of circumstances has brought about this loss. One is the decrease in wheatears, another the protection of the bird by law, and a third the refusal of the farmers to allow their men any longer to neglect the flocks by setting and tending snares. ”

“ Who would have thought to find a tree-planter in the wheatear, the bird of the stony waste and open naked down, who does not even ask for a bush to perch on?
It then occurred to me that in every case where I had observed a clump of elder bushes on the bare downside, it grew upon a village or collection of rabbit burrows, and it is probable that in every case the clump owed its existence to the wheatears who had dropped the seed about their nesting-place. The clump where I had sought a shelter from the storm was composed of large old dilapidated-looking half-dead elders ”

“ As a matter of fact, the winter home of the wheatear is Africa. The capture of wheatears—mostly illegally by nets—still continues in a very small way to meet a languid demand, but the Sussex ortolan, as the little bird was sometimes called, has passed from the bill of fare. Wheatears (which, despite Fuller, have no connection with ears of wheat, the word signifying white tail) still abound, skimming over the turf in little groups; but they no longer fly towards the dinner table. ”

“ Where these conveniences are not accessible, the nest may be found at the foot of a bush, screened from view by grass or foliage. The eggs, five or six in number, are of a delicate pale blue, occasionally spotted at the larger end with pale rust colour.
The geographical range of the Wheatear is very extensive for so small and short-winged a bird. It is found in the Faroe Isles, Iceland, and Greenland; in Lapland, Norway, Sweden, and Denmark; throughout Europe to the Mediterranean; in Egypt, Arabia, Asia Minor, and Armenia. ”

“ Mode of Taking.—Limed twigs must be placed on the stones or stakes where these birds rest, or even on sticks fixed in the ground for the purpose, and they must be driven gently towards the snares.
Attractive Qualities.—No one would take the trouble to tame a full-grown wheatear, unless passionately fond of keeping birds. I have one, that, by the use of plenty of fresh ants’ eggs, has been accustomed to range the room. Its plumage is pleasing, its actions graceful; it is continually waving and spreading its fine tail. ”

“ While the Mediterranean populations remain sedentary, the more northern breeding birds are migratory. Most likely, those birds that did not migrate from the North were eliminated by severe weather. Similarly, the wheatear, yellow wagtail, and Arctic warbler have extended their breeding ranges eastward across the Bering Sea into Alaska, but the wheatear, for instance, migrates all the way back across Asia to Africa where it winters with other wheatears coming from Europe, Iceland, and Greenland. ”

“ Good examples of this crooked traditional path can be seen in the routes taken by Old World species extending their ranges into the New World from Europe and Asia. The European wheatear has extended its range into Greenland and Labrador where the local breeding population has become a separate race. When the Labrador individuals depart from their breeding grounds, they proceed north to Greenland, their ancestral home, then west to Europe and south to Africa, the traditional wintering area for all wheatears. ”

“ I was often there afterwards, spending long hours sitting on the rocks of the great head and shoulders, watching the sea and the birds that live in it; and later, when April set the tiny bell of the rock pipit tinkling, and the wheatear, hovering over the crags, dropped his brief delicious warble, and when the early delicate flowers touched the rocks and turf with tender, brilliant colour, I was more enamoured than ever of my lonely castle by the sea. ”

“ In those days they were esteemed very delicious articles of food, and though the taste may not have died out, yet, owing to the large tracts of waste land which have been reclaimed since that era, the haunts of the Wheatear have been much encroached upon and virtually broken up. It is, too, common knowledge that the species is an adept at the art of mimicry ”

“ On August 10, among rocks at the base of moraines, the wheatear was the second most common species. On August 15, after snow had fallen on the mountain and in the valley and the skies there were cloudy, wheatears moved onto the alluvium but always within at least 150 feet of moraines to which the birds retreated when alarmed. An adult female, shot on August 1, on the lower slopes of Mount Mary at the south end of Lake Peters, was 158 mm long and weighed 26 grams. ”

“ Most of the birds taken are young; they are excessively fat, and are esteemed a great delicacy. The wheatear harvest has, however, now dwindled down to something very small compared with former times; it astonishes us to read in Pennant that a century and a quarter ago eighteen hundred dozens of these birds were annually taken in the neighbourhood of Eastbourne alone. ”

“ It has the top of the head, nape, and back of a bluish-grey colour, tinged with light brown, rump and upper two-thirds of tail pure white. Wings nearly black, with buff margins and tips to some of the feathers, end of tail black; chin and throat dull white; breast pale creamy white, turning to a dull yellowish-white on the under parts. The female is somewhat browner on her upper parts than the male. The Wheatear may always be readily distinguished by the large white patch at the base of its tail, seen most conspicuously when the bird is flying away from the observer. ”

“ The young leave the nest as soon as they are able to hop and flutter, and are then jealously guarded by their parents, who fly round in great excitement if you approach too near. They are soon well on the wing, however, and the old birds are free to burden themselves with another family. During the early part of May, a large variety of the Wheatear may sometimes be seen, most frequently along the sea-shore; these are birds whose home is in the Far North, and which regularly pass through these islands at this time. ”

“ The middle of the song consists of a rattling repetition of the same character as the full rattle I have just described. The last syllables, "wheatear," have always seemed to me to be very interesting, as relating the song of the Chaffinch to those of the Greenfinch and Lesser Bedpoll. The "wheat" is greatly varied in loudness, and is very often wholly absent, or its place is occupied by a sound like "tissi." ”

“ Mr. Agnew writes:—"The night of Sept. 2nd was very stormy, wind S.E., shifting to N.E., with heavy rain. The birds were all in large numbers throughout the night, except a Blue-throated Warbler, adult, which was solitary." On the 12th, nearly all Wheatears left the Isle of May. On the 4th, at Pentland Skerries, a rush all day with strong N. wind and rain. Indications at Bell Rock very faint throughout. In the vast rush of Turdidæ and other species (see Turdidæ under date) of Nov. 1st, one solitary Wheatear is first recorded, the first notice since Sept. 12th. ”

“ Just as we are inclined to put ours aside, we discover that what appears to be the shell is nothing but paste, and, breaking it open, find inside a delicately cooked little bird of the wheatear species. ”

“ In winter and spring there are rooks everywhere; as summer advances, most leave the town for the fields.
A marked sign of spring in Brighton is the return of the wheatears; they suddenly appear in the waste places by the houses in the first few days of April. Wheatears often run a considerable distance on the sward very swiftly, usually stopping on some raised spot of the turf. Meadow-pipits are another spring bird here; any one going up the Dyke Road in early spring will observe a little brown bird singing in the air much like a lark, but more feebly. ”

“ It builds its nest of grass, moss, and leaves, and lines it with hair or wool, selecting some very secret spot on the ground, a deserted rabbit-burrow or cavity under a rock, where, beyond the reach of any but the most cunning marauder, it lays five or six eggs. Early in August, when the young are fully fledged, the scattered colonies of Wheatears assemble for emigration on open downs near the sea. We have seen a good many of them on the sandy coast of Norfolk and of North Hales ”