A Siberian Waif

Monday 4th December 2017
A Siberian waif
Today I found the rarest bird to grace the smallholding since I moved here. Even more satisfying was the fact that it was in the patch of young woodland that I planted when I moved in.
I was walking the circuit of the smallholding with the dogs when a bird started calling loudly behind me. The call was clear but certainly not that of any bird species I would expect to encounter on such a walk.
I located the bird straight away, a chiffchaff. This small plain warbler is a common summer migrant to this country and one whose song and call I am very familiar with. I see chiffchaffs on the farm mostly in the autumn when birds migrate through.
Increasingly chiffchaffs winter in this country, though mostly in the south. Early December is certainly a notable time for one to appear here, but there was something special about this one. For as soon as I laid eyes on it that strange call made sense. The bird was pretty much plain brown (paler below, but importantly no hints of yellow or olive-green), even plainer than our usual chiffchaffs. Chiffchaffs come in a range of dull colours, but one so plain and brown would certainly come from quite a way east. Paired with the distinctive call this bird was undoubtedly a Siberian Chiffchaff. I played the call on a phone app just to be sure and it matched 100%. The bird even appeared to call back. The Latin subspecies name for this type of chiffchaff is tristis, which means sad, presumably because the call is a drawn out, monotone plaintive one. Unfortunately not judged to be a full species in its own right, but I have only ever encountered a handful of these birds in my years of birding. I have seen plenty of brownish chiffchaffs, greyish ones too, ones with odd calls too, but very few which so clearly match all the criteria for a tristis.
How fantastic that such a small bird can have made it all the way from Siberia to my farm! It should be wintering in the Himalayas but presumably fancied a bit of a flatter landscape.

For non-birders, just so you know just how plain the bird is! Not my actual bird, but a dead ringer, this one in Doncaster in 2009.


I found the bird late afternoon and it was generally hanging about with two blue tits. I watched it for maybe half an hour, at which point it was time to give the chickens a few handfuls of grain to keep them going through the cold night. Darkness falls quickly at this time of year and presumably the bird went to roost somewhere nearby.
Interestingly, a Siberian Chiffchaff was also reported on the Yorkshire coast at almost exactly the time as I found mine and another was trapped and ringed on the Essex coast two days later.

Wednesday 6th December 2017
Tuesday was my six-monthly hospital visit to London, so I was unable to check if the bird was still present. Having been poked and prodded I stayed at home Wednesday and just mooched around the smallholding with the dogs. There was no sign of the Siberian Chiffchaff all day.

I did however come across this beaut of a mangel wurzel. I posted it onto the Smallholders Facebook page along with the message

I 💚 mangel wurzels