The (presumed) Italian Job

It was a pretty hard, gritty day yesterday - more than the usual antics after school. And so, what could be better than a calm early morning drive to East Devon? Probably a calm early morning drive to East Devon for something other than a presumed Italian Sparrow...

But beggars can't be choosers, and in the game of twitching it is about the numbers. A marathon and not a sprint. So when you've got a precarious species, a bird that looks like that precarious species and a drive of just under four hours each way - you just have to do it. I wasn't wholly adverse to it, as London birding has been terrible recently (no Caspian Gull since before my Shetland trip!). And so I went to East Budleigh, arriving just after 9am this morning. Within a few minutes, the male Italian-type Sparrow turned up at the feeders for a minute or two, did its thing and then flew off. It looked no different to the ones I'd seen hopping about among the ruins of Pompeii last May, bar the slightly larger than usual upper mandible on this Devon bird.

male presumed Italian Sparrow East Budleigh, Devon 18th November 2017

And so that was that. I briefly stopped off in the little village shop, purchased some local cheese and a coffee, reminded myself once again what life is like outside London and the southeast... and then returned to London, where in the Rotherhithe gloom I had a couple of metal ringed Black-headed Gulls, one Belgian and a regular German bird.