unidentified bird call, SW France (1 Viewer)

Hi,
can anyone help with this bird?
I live in the country in SW France close to the Pyrenees. There are fields and hedgerows all around. There is a small deciduous wood adjoining our land and the bird is in there but not visible.

The call is strident, loud and clear. Main times are morning and evening but it is not limited to those times. I know some of the birds that live here and their calls and it is not: green woodpecker, jay, magpie, crow, buzzard, nuthatch, blackbird alarm or starling. Hoopoe and Golden Oriole visit but in summer.

Now the hard part. The main call is repeated often and goes weee-you, weee-you. Then there is wheep, wheep, wheep, and many more in that vein. There is no singing as such and it gets monotonous after a while - it is a very vocal bird.

My first guess is a Mynah bird on drugs. My second is Mistle Thrush but there is no melodious singing or that rattling flight call. Do they just call as opposed to sing at certain times?

Any ideas?

Sounds like (pardon the pun!) a Song Thrush.

My first thought was Song Thrush as well – but that does not turn "monotonous". It tends to sing many different phrases, usually repeated three times: wee-you wee-you wee-you, tututu-tututu-tututu, tidili-tidili-tidili et: mms://audio.bl.uk/media/wildlife/song_thrush01.wma
It could well be a Nuthatch if it only makes these "car alarm-like" sounds like you seem to describe: mms://audio.bl.uk/media/wildlife/nuthatch02.wma.
Both Nuthatch and Song Thrush are very vocal already.

If the links don't work, try: http://www.bl.uk/collections/sound-archive/listentonature/soundstax/groups.html

Hi Firecrest and Xenospiza. I went to the RSPB audio library and wasn't sure about Song Thrush. Then I went to Xeno's link and it could be a Song Thrush with a French accent. Ours isn't quite as musical but I will listen for the 'three times' repetition.

Not as repetitive as the Nuthatch recording. Ours don't go on that for that long but it is amazing the sound they put out. We save hazelnuts in the autumn and feed the Nutties now with them.
Dank Je Wel!

It's still early in the year, the bird may not be in full song, the RSPB recording is sure to be of a singing bird in April.

If it was as large as a song thrush you would think you might have seen it especially as they tend to sit reasonably exposed when singing also I wouldn't really describe the song thrush as "strident"!
At the moment with us (Andalucia) the sardinian warblers are very vocal ,quite difficult to see in cover, repetitive, and strident to the point of almost being mechanical.