Not so Savi's - how not to see an elusive warbler
Misleading title aside, I did see a Savi's Warbler this week, as you can see from the world class photography in this blog. I saw it because of the fieldcraft of one birder, and despite a lack of fieldcraft from another.
Until events of the last year, I was a loud, gregarious, energetic presence with extrovert qualities that I'm sure annoyed many a birder - a voice that carries like mine is sure to irritate. Can't be helped. Preferring to move than stand still; to walk than wait; to make things happen rather than wait for them to happen to me. I don't feel guilty - we are who we are and if I offended you at a twitch with my volume, or a joke, or my constant movement then I'm sure you haven't lost any sleep over it. I definitely haven't. However, part of learning to see birds is to become self-aware as much as you become aware of the wild world around you, and to cultivate self-control of these aspects of personality; to have the discipline to wait, to be quiet, to listen as much as you look. Especially when elusive birds are more often located by call than by sight.
Savi's Warbler is one of a group of birds that are absolutely the most frustrating to try to locate. With a habit of singing from within reedbed and long grass, their reeling song is often difficult to separate out from, for example, elements of reed or sedge warbler, let alone grasshopper warbler and actual grasshoppers distorted by distance; and far off Skylark trills can sound surprisingly like the ticking spool of a calling Savi's. Their singing time is limited to early morning and late evening, and add to this a ventriloquial quality where the angle and facing of the head can make their call sound like it's coming from somewhere other than where the bird is sitting. All this, and usually in a dense environment with few natural lines of sight.
In short, searching for Savi's requires quiet patience, focus, and an ear that is attuned to the sounds of a reedbed. It often takes more than one visit to see the bird even if you've heard it several times.
I was delighted when a local birder pulled up beside me at Rimac NNR in Saltfleetby in Lincolnshire just after 6am - local knowledge is vital when in a new place; and even more happy to find that he knew where the Savi's liked to perch. We walked together, introducing ourselves as birders do (no names, but where we come from and what we'd seen recently), until we reached a decent vantage and we then stood in silence for more than 35 minutes before hearing any reeling, which was intermittent, distant and difficult to pick out of the wind and other noises of the marsh. Green Sandpiper piping loudly flushed up by calling Marsh Harriers, and a Snipe zipped past at head height. Still the Savi's called, faint and far away, facing away from us as we tried to compensate for a crosswind by cupping ears and standing stock still.
We were joined by an enthusiastic man who had seen the warbler the previous day. He was friendly, and engaging, full of anecdotes and stories. He showed me a dozen phone photos of the Savi's, and asked a hundred questions, never really waiting for the answers before embarking on a new line of enquiry, butterflying in an engaging way. He was funny and charismatic and I initially warmed to him - the kind of guy I want to be with in a pub: funny, interesting, loud but not obnoxious.
But he was not the guy I wanted to be with while I tried to locate a Savi's that was sitting low to avoid the wind. On the fourth time he spoke over the Savi's call, I asked him to just give me a couple of minutes to listen. Sure, sure. An apologetic shrug and a wry smile.
He was quiet for no more than 15 seconds.
I walked away to a vantage a little further down the path, but was followed, and a touch of irritation crept in. I try not to let these flashes of negativity gain a foothold in my mind - I have definitely been the annoying man at the twitch wearing a noisy rustling coat, or whispering in the loudest sotto voce you've ever heard, and if I learned anything from my degrees in philosophy, it's that everyone deserves a measure of grace. But my patience was wearing thin. The only time he wasn't talking was when he was vaping some noxious toffee candy flavoured chemical, which I could smell 20 metres away. This is a more and more common issue when birders gather - most smokers ask if people nearby have any objections, and will then remove themselves a distance before lighting up. Vaping seems to not have that social etiquette established, and I despise inhaling clouds of second-hand watermelon shite. I genuinely prefer the smell of cigarettes. I had long since given up on replying to his comments, at first feeling rude, but then as I was being subjected to a repetitive monologue about him seeing the Savi's Warbler that was preventing me from seeing the Savi's Warbler, I stopped worrying about my manners and turned my back on the man.
I did eventually find the warbler, and both the birders I met there also got views of it, but it was no surprise to me that I got the best views with my silent colleague after the garrulous birder had walked off, whistling loudly, to find Hobbies. It's a gorgeous bird, understated but with an angle to the face when it sings that gives it character. The unmarked breast and plain undertail make it look very clean in the field, and when it sits high on the reed and reels it's unmistakeable. This was the second Savi's I've seen following hearing half a dozen over the last five years, and it felt like a win against the odds - the wind, the disturbance, the size of the habitat.
Perhaps I've overstated my irritation in this post. Both these birders were good people to be around, but only one of them was good to be around while actively searching for a bird. Maybe I'm just a grumpy middle-aged man, who needs to remind himself that he has been the irritation many times in the past. I am always inclined to the forgiving side of well-intentioned behaviour, and maybe the best thing would be to take this as a salutary lesson for my own behaviour in the next crowd searching for a bird.
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