by Alex Horne
‘Flamingos!’ he said.
‘That’s right,’ said David, ‘greater flamingos. And to their right, there are a couple of great white pelicans.’ We each took turns on his telescope, looking at these fantasy birds. A true professional, David had saved this treat till last.
But there was time for one more act of gallantry. On the way back to the botanical gardens, Mat told David he was now just one short of 300 birds for his time in Africa. David went quiet for five minutes. A few sharp turns and back alleys later, he pulled over at the side of the road.
‘Up there,’ he said, pointing up and out of his window. ‘See on that awning? That’s an Indian house crow. Have you got that yet?’
‘No,’ said Mat, ‘but I have now – 300!’
We all cheered, and looked forward to toasting the total as soon as possible. In the rear-view mirror I saw David smiling to himself: another job well done.
10 September
On our final day in Africa, Rachel and I said our goodbyes to Mat and Morri (by now Mat and I had reverted back to waving rather than hugging) and took the cable car up Table Mountain for a final look down at Cape Town and the seas beyond. As we stood on the table top, contemplating the magnificent city below and our reluctance to go to work on Monday (I say ‘go to work’ I mean ‘stay at home to work’), I caught sight of two birds of prey gliding round to the east. I had a good look at them through my binoculars, Rachel did too, and together we identified them as black kites. They definitely had forked tails. This was a fine way to end the trip: we’d survived a holiday with birdwatching in it.
I’d seen a total of ninety-six new species in two weeks, close enough to a hundred to make me contemplate calling David and begging him to reveal four more birds, but Rachel said that would be creepy. So I left David alone and Africa behind.
The following day was my twenty-eighth birthday. We went straight from the airport to Midhurst, where Rachel’s parents were staying with mine for the weekend, and I think we surprised them all when most of our stories (well, most of mine, but some of Rachel’s) revolved around birds.
Duncton, I should say, accepted my new numbers with remarkable composure.
My seventh birthday wish list. Despite Duncton’s hint in the form of personalised notepaper, none of my requests had anything to do with birds.
17 September
My first birdwatching expedition back in the UK was a little different to David’s extensive Cape tour. I was still following the capital’s birding scene through the London Birders website, but not much had turned up since my repatriation. I did, however, notice that a man called Tony Duckett was offering guided bird tours around Regent’s Park. This was interesting. I resolved to join him on his final walk of the year. After all, he’d written that we might see barn owls and I hadn’t yet. I wanted to see barn owls.
I’m quite fond of Regent’s Park. It’s one of the few places in London I’d always want to show off to a visiting friend. If David ever came to visit, I’d take him here.8 Not nearly as garish as Hyde Park, the lawns are always manicured, the flowers constantly in bloom (well, that’s how it seems) and, of course, you can see the heads of the giraffes in the northwest corner. It may not quite have the glamour of the Kirstenbosch botanical gardens, but I like it.
Tony, meanwhile, was positively passionate about the park. He’d worked there as assistant bird keeper since 1977, before I was even born, and was currently the park’s Wildlife Officer. He was in charge of the wildlife and, in particular, the birds, of which, he told me, 200 species had been spotted in its square mile and a half. Two hundred! In a park bang in the middle of Greater London, next door to Madame Tussauds!
I had arrived at the appointed bandstand ten minutes early for the 8 a.m. start time, as I wanted to impress Tony. Six other hopefuls were already there, loitering. The night’s mist had pretty much lifted but we still must have made an eerie sight – zombies with binoculars, lurking in silence.
Tony pulled up in his green parkmobile, looking almost exactly like David. Tall, dynamic, khaki shorts; I thought for a minute that he actually was David, then pulled myself together and told myself to forget all about David.
‘Here we are then!’ said David – sorry, Tony – confidently. The loiterers snapped into action, transforming themselves into a crack squadron of birders. Most people had their own binoculars, and Tony handed out pairs to those who didn’t. Everything was looking good.
Unfortunately, by the time we were ready to set off, our numbers had swelled. More and more people had arrived, attracted, like me, by the promise of owls. Tony counted the group. He didn’t want to lose anyone on the way round. We were his responsibility.
‘Mmm, sixteen. Possibly a bit too big,’ he muttered. I agreed.
But the size of the group wasn’t our biggest problem. Our biggest problem was that a quarter of the group were drunk. I couldn’t quite decide if they’d been up all night or had risen early with the aim of treating the walk like a morning pub crawl, but either way four friends – three women and a bloke – were oozing alcohol from every pore. I hoped we hadn’t been quite so intoxicating when we’d arrived at Kirstenbosch. The smell of booze hung around them like an alcoholic cartoon cloud. What’s more, they’d actually brought a bottle of sherry with them, and as we walked they passed it amongst themselves, glugging enthusiastically. At one point they offered it to the rest of the group. The bottle got handed about politely but no one else had a slug.
Despite these boozy shenanigans, we did manage to find twenty-nine species of birds in our allotted three hours. Well, Tony found them and pointed them out to us. If I’d been on my own I probably would have struggled to get into double figures, so was pleased to have got up at dawn on my Sunday morning for this bird lesson. With Tony’s help we’d seen a long-tailed tit, grey heron, goldcrest, little grebe, great spotted woodpecker, chiffchaff, and the two pirates, whitethroat and blackcap.9
But we hadn’t seen any birds I needed for my list. We hadn’t seen the redwings, spotted flycatchers10 and fieldfares Tony was hoping for and we hadn’t seen my barn owls. I blamed this on the drunks but I couldn’t really be cross with them. I think they had a terrific morning birdwatchingdrinking, staggering round, rolling increasingly poor-quality cigarettes, and finding the whole thing more and more amusing. As their giggling increased, the rest of the group found them funnier and funnier. We were birdwatchingdrinkingwatching and we bonded through our observation. We exchanged sly glances when the sherry bottle became wielded with more abandon, subtle smirks when one of the ladies had to ‘freshen up’ in a bush.
It was an odd morning. It didn’t go quite how Tony expected and wasn’t nearly as smooth as David’s tour, but it was free, it was in London and it was memorable. Two members of the group were tourists from America and Italy11 respectively and I watched their reactions with pride. By the time we staggered off on our separate ways I was even fonder of Regent’s Park than ever before.
25 September
I’ve mentioned before how easy it is to procrastinate when you’re working from home. Just before writing that sentence I checked what the weather was going to be this coming weekend – not because I’ve got plans, but because it meant I didn’t have to write that sentence for another minute or two.12
The internet is the most useful implement in my procrastination toolbox. I could while away hours in front of the TV, but I’d feel guilty. I could put off work by tidying my desk, but I prefer it messy. Browsing the internet is a much more satisfactory way of dawdling, because it very nearly feels like work – I’m at my computer, I’m typing. So, as my Big Year progressed, I started to check the London Birders website every half an hour. It was addictively diverting. And just occasionally, it paid dividends.
Not much had happened that morning on any of the windows open on my laptop. I’d written very little, the birders had written very little, it was a slow Monday. But then, at 12.30 p.m., just as I was starting to think about lunch, a message flashe
d up on the forum:
Barred Warbler at East India Dock from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. No further information. I’m off there now!
John
I leaped out of my seat. This was the ideal distraction: a rare bird, particularly scarce in London,13 had been sighted during work hours. I was just a few miles away and I was available. It was my duty to get down there and make the place safe (i.e. see if I could see it too). I rushed into the kitchen, quickly made myself some lunch (I was in a rush but I was also hungry) and checked my emails again. Another had arrived, this time from Birdguides reading:
25/09 12:27 LONDON, GREATER: Barred Warbler, East India Dock Basin NR [A] 1st-winter in northeast corner, frequenting rosehips and hawthorn 100m beyond red lifebelt. Parking restricted.
I won’t drive then, I thought. I was keen not to get any more parking tickets. I chucked my binoculars and bird guide in a bag, ran out of the house, very nearly bumped into an Italian neighbour and Harry the performing pigeon, and rushed down to East India Dock Basin as quick as my legs and the London transport system could carry me.
Which wasn’t very quick. East India Dock isn’t easy to get to from Kensal Green. I had to change lines twice, hop on the Docklands Light Railway, hop off at West India Quay and walk a mile in some ridiculously heavy rain. Only the day before I’d been in the post office and heard a lady (probably the same lady as back in July) complaining that it shouldn’t be this hot in September: ‘It is close isn’t it? I mean, it’s much more muggy than it should be really. But then I suppose it is a funny time of year …’ Now, soaking wet and shivering, I wanted to tell her that I didn’t find it funny at all.
I arrived at the basin at 2.30 p.m., 120 minutes after being called to arms. I dug out the now soggy copy of the Birdguides email from my pocket: ‘northeast corner, frequenting rosehips and hawthorn 100m beyond red lifebelt’ I read for the fiftieth time. That was all the information I needed. I could find this bird. I felt, once more, like a spy. ‘Frequenting rosehips’ and ‘hawthorn’ could easily have been secret code for enemy agents.
Thirty minutes later, I felt less like a spy. I felt like a wet loser. The rain was unrelenting and I’d found nothing, no birds, no birdwatchers, no rosehips, no hawthorn, no northeast corner. I had found a red lifebelt, but then I’d found another red lifebelt, and another. There were hundreds of red lifebelts. I tried to find one with rosehips and hawthorn just beyond it, but then I realised I didn’t know what rosehips or hawthorn looked like. I’m not a dad. I’m not a David. And while I did have my bird guide I’d neglected to pack my British Shrubberies Guide. I was floundering.
But then, just as I was nearing the murky bottom of my ebb, I found hope in the form of two men with telescopes. They were soaking wet and standing in a particularly desolate corner of the harbour, a recess in the north bank of the Thames, surrounded by council flats and drowned by the noise of aircraft taking off and landing at City Airport further down the river. Normally, I wouldn’t rush into this sort of scene, but emboldened by the year so far, I strode purposefully over.
Both men had their hoods up so didn’t see me coming – they had very poor peripheral vision. They didn’t need peripheral vision. Their eyes and scopes were trained on some bushes that I presumed were either hawthorn, rosehips or both. They couldn’t hear me coming either because it was raining so hard, so I hovered just behind them.
Now what? I didn’t want to make them jump and scare off the bird. But then I didn’t want them to find me skulking behind them and think I was a weirdo. I had to do something.
I coughed. One of them spun round wildly, showering me with rain drops. I tried to look like I’d just that second arrived: ‘Looking for the barred warbler?’ I asked nonchalantly.
‘Yeah,’ one of the wet men said miserably.
‘Right,’ I said, ‘it is a funny time of year.’
The three of us (they were both big men, one taciturn, the other with a large scar across his face) spent the next forty-five minutes in what I hoped was companionable silence, staring at the dripping bushes. They had deftly attached plastic bags with elastic bands to keep their telescopes dry. I worried that my new binoculars might break in the rain and spent most of the time trying to remember where I’d put the receipt.
Thirty minutes later there was still no sign of the bird, but the rain had let up and more big men started to arrive. Scarface and Quietman barely acknowledged them. I followed suit. I was sorely tempted to share my wisdom (‘It’s been raining …’) but didn’t want to sound like a dude.
An hour later there were eleven of us lined up a hundred yards from that red lifebelt, gazing at the bushes. Six of them had their own telescopes. There were enough of us to form a football team, but instead we were gawking at shrubs. The final four to join us had all piled out of one car, which they’d screeched to a halt and parked, presumably illegally, in a nearby bay. The driver had an earring and one eye. He was clearly the leader. Within ten minutes of arriving he’d pointed out whitethroats and blackcaps that none of us originals had registered.
At 4.30 p.m. there was the first non-raindrop-related movement in the hawthorn (or the rosehips; I hadn’t asked). ‘There’s something over there,’ gasped one of the leader’s crew. We all looked in the direction in which his telescope seemed to be pointing.
‘That’s it,’ said the leader firmly. ‘That’s the barred warbler!’
We all spent the next ten minutes looking through our scopes at what was a hugely unimpressive and unimpressed bird, peaking out from the wet leaves. It was small and brown and warbly. I tried to sound excited, but I’d spent a whole afternoon wasting work time waiting for this moment, and the warbler just didn’t justify the build-up.
But during those frantic first seconds, when the bird had first emerged from its hiding place and everyone was straining desperately for a glimpse, I’d felt part of the gang. That brief flutter was something. What’s more, in that initial frenzy, one of the group had whispered desperately, ‘I can’t get it? Where is it? Lee? Where is it, Lee?’
This was all the confirmation I needed. The one-eyed driver was Lee G R Evans, Britain’s top twitcher, part-time mobile disco DJ and arch rival of Riley.
‘You see that silver birch tree bursting out of the greenery,’ Lee said calmly, ‘it’s just to the right of that. It’s stretching. Nice crescentic markings …’
That was Lee G R Evans all right. I was far more excited to see him than the bird. I plucked up the courage to ask him for a look through his scope, but what I wanted to do was train it on him. He had made the trip worthwhile. I’d found one of Britain’s most famous birders in his natural habitat, without even having to watch a quiz at a birdfair. As I squinted through his lens, trying my best to work out just what ‘crescentic markings’ might be, he whispered in my ear, ‘It’s beautiful, innit?’ I looked up at his stubbly, yes, weather-beaten face.
‘Yes,’ I replied, ‘it is.’
A few people drifted off after the identification was made, but I stayed because Lee G R Evans stayed. I wanted to see this man at work.
More people arrived, too. They’d been following the bird’s progress on Birdguides and the London Birders forum (Quietman had been texting in regular reports) and as soon as the sighting was confirmed (and they could get out of work) they rushed down to the scene. I’d left by the time Andrew, my Welsh Harp guide, turned up but he added to the forum:
Got a brief view at 5.45 p.m. then located it feeding in the bottom of a bush at about 6 p.m. It showed well for a few seconds then crashed its way back inside the bush and I didn’t see it again. A typical showing by a barred warbler but that’ll do me for my London list.
My favourite character (except, of course, Lee) was a jolly man who must have been in his seventies. Swaggering over to the crowd, he took one look at the warbler through some antique binoculars and pronounced, ‘Yes, that’s it!’ He then spent the next ten minutes boasting about a white-crowned sparrow he’d observed from his caravan in Essex
for two weeks over the summer. I noticed a few people smirk at this. A white-crowned sparrow had only been spotted four times in the UK before: twice at Fair Isle, once in Yorkshire, and once at Seaforth in Merseyside.14 Lee could not let it go.
‘Oh, that was you with the white crown was it?’ he asked gently. ‘I went up there a few times, couldn’t see it. Are you sure it was a white-crowned sparrow and not a tree sparrow?’
The jolly man backed down instantly, not expecting his bluff to be called so promptly.
‘Well, I guess it could have been a tree sparrow,’ he said quietly.
‘As a verb, noun and adjective, string describes the act of making up birds,’ writes Mark Cocker. ‘String is a sin that strikes at the very heart of birding. We don’t tolerate it. We seldom forgive it. Once labelled, a person often goes to their grave with the mark, as if it were indelibly tattooed in capitals across their forehead – STRINGER … Simply to be free of such a taint is as much reputation as many birders ever seek.’
29 September
I ended the month in Dublin, 6,000 miles (as the crow flies15) from Cape Town. I was over for a couple of shows in Ireland but my Galway gig clashed with the World International Oyster Opening Competition, so numbers were low. I guess the population of Galway was either celebrating having opened a lot of oysters that day or were practising opening oysters for the next day’s exciting event. Either way, the town was full of people keen on tackling shellfish, but the comedy club was empty.