Monday, December 13, 2010
FIELDFARES and redwings are often lumped together.
There are good reasons for this being closely related members of the thrush family. Both are winter visitors to Ireland that arrive and depart at around the same time. They often travel around the countryside in mixed flocks.
But they never mix during the breeding season because they come to us from different parts of the world. Almost all the redwings that over-winter in Ireland belong to a sub-species that spends the summer in Iceland and the Faroe Islands and which have recently colonised part of south Greenland. Fieldfares have a huge breeding range across northern Europe and north Asia but almost all our birds come to us from northern Norway and Sweden or Finland.
The number of both species that visit us in winter varies, and so does the time of their arrival. Fieldfares mostly eat insects, worms and slugs in summer. Then in autumn they change to a diet of berries, particularly rowan berries.
They don’t start migrating south-westwards until the Scandinavian berry crop is used up. Then they start arriving in the midlands and south of England. If the weather there is harsh, or the food supply is poor, large numbers will then head on to Ireland.
The breeding range of the redwing supports far fewer berry bearing trees and shrubs, so they have little opportunity for a fruit-eating transition from their carnivorous summer diet to their vegetarian winter one. The timing of their arrival in Ireland seems to be more dependent on day-length and weather and is rather more consistent. The first birds are usually spotted in late October with the bulk of them arriving in November. Both species normally leave in March, though individuals have been known to linger on into May and both species have been recorded as breeding here, although rarely.
Fieldfares are unlike most thrushes in that they nest in colonies.
Some appear to act as guards and if a predator approaches, particularly a magpie or a jay, they mobilise a army to protect it. Though they have few weapons, apart from an uncanny accuracy in depositing their droppings, the results are normally formidable and effective.
A similar, though rather less spectacular, behaviour can sometimes take place in their Irish wintering grounds. A group of fieldfares will adopt a bush of hawthorn, holly or rowan with a good crop of berries and defend it against any potential poachers.
Redwings and fieldfares are basically farmland birds in Ireland.
But Ireland tends to be the last stop on their migration journey. So if the weather gets bad here and the wild berry crops start to dry up they will visit gardens, particularly rural gardens, searching out cotoneasters or cultivated rowans and whitebeams. If you want to attract them into your garden both species are very fond of apples, as indeed are their relations, our native blackbirds.
The spell of recent harsh weather came from the north east and pushed unusually large numbers of redwings and fieldfares in front of it so they are worth looking out for at present.
Redwings are relatively small thrushes and the dull red underwing that gives them their name is most obvious when they’re in flight.
They also have a distinctive cream stripe above the eye.
Field fares are nearly as large as mistle thrushes and are best distinguished from them by their prominent grey rumps and napes.
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