Lesser Whitethroat ? East London (1 Viewer)

[Liverbird37]

Hi everyone hope you are all well. I had a bird visit my garden feeders today and wanted to get your opinions on its I'd. I'm guessing it's a Lesser Whitethroat, but understand that they migrate to Africa in October so I could well have got it wrong.

It's a bit smaller Than a Great Tit, but bigger than a Blue Tit. It's legs were dark grey colour. It fed only on the fat cake I had. It sat quite happily in my elderberry tree for a good 10mins. Seemed very relaxed and in no hurry to leave. I had hoped it would move so I could get pics of its back but it refused to oblige.

I apologise the pic isn't better. It was taken from inside the house as I didn't want to scare it off. I live east London (Barking) a couple of minutes walk from the river Thames. Is it usual for Whitethroats to stay in the UK over Winter ? I'd be so very very grateful for any help you may be able to offer me. Thank you so very much for in advance.

 

[THE_FERN]

Certainly looks like lesser whitethroat. It's rare but not unheard of for them to overwinter

 

[Phil Andrews]

Certainly a Lesser Whitethroat - any other images available which may help in tying it down to a particular subspecies?

 

[Richard Prior]

Welcome to Birdforum Liverbird! You lucky thing having this bird visiting in winter! Good luck trying to get other images, especially when it turns it back on you as upperpart colour and wing and tail construction can help identify if it has come from far away!

 

[Liverbird37]

I just want to say a huge thank you to you all for taking the time to reply. I’m so incredibly grateful. Your time and expertise is so very appreciated.

Sadly, despite it resting in the tree for a good 10mins, these were the only pics I managed to get. It looked like it was falling asleep. I am working from home so am going to keep a very a daily watch on the feeders to see if it comes back. Im a bit annoyed with myself as when it was feeding it had it’s back to me. By time I’d run upstairs to get camera and come back down it had finished eating. It came back an hour later and managed to miss the back a second time. I will do my absolute best though to see if I can spot it again. It did float around the shrubs where I’d thrown some live mealworms so hope they’ll encourage it back.

I can’t say thank you enough for all your kind help.

 

[Alexander Stöhr]

Hello,

welcome to birdforum!
And thanks for joining this group to alert others of a (possible) rare bird.

I had the same thoughts as Phil and Richard, any winter Lesser Whitethroat is worth to suspect of belonging to one of the eastern forms:

https://norfolkbirds.weebly.com/eastern-lesser-whitethroat.html

The Siberian Lesser Whitethroat in Tynemouth

Colin Bradshaw and Martin Collinson discuss the appearance and DNA of the wintering Lesser Whitethroat in Tynemouth.

www.birdguides.com

Siberian Lesser Whitethroat - Spurn 9th - 12th October (to get an idea of the pictures needed for ID)

Siberian and Desert Lesser Whitethroats

Shetland Explorations… by Martin G. 23rd September 2012 – a year ago yesterday a ‘Desert’ Lesser Whitethroat was trapped at Spurn. Subsequent DNA analysis matched it to bird…

birdingfrontiers.wordpress.com

Club300 Germany (in german)

Siberian Lesser Whitethroat (<i>blythi</i>) in Denmark

UPDATE : The result of the genetic analysis confirms what we had always thought - that this was a Central Asian Lesser Whitethroat somewhe...

birdsdk.blogspot.com

I hope you find it again!

 

[Liverbird37]

The bird came back today. It’s spent quite a bit of time in and out of the garden using the fat feeder. I’ve got a couple more pics that may be of more help which I’ll upload later. I’m trying really hard to get one of it on the feeder as it shows the whole of its back, but the little devil is so damn fast. It may take a bit of effort but hopefully I’ll be able to get one.

 

[KenM]

Would be great if you could get more images Liverbird, believe I can see some brown tints to the head in both images, might support it being of Eastern origin…a great record.👍

Cheers

 

[Val35]

Is it really possible to identify lesser whitethroat subspecies on the field ?
It seems to me that even with the bird in hand, DNA sample is welcome to confirm ?

 

[KenM]

Is it really possible to identify lesser whitethroat subspecies on the field ?
It seems to me that even with the bird in hand, DNA sample is welcome to confirm ?

Brown tints to nape and head + white outer tail rectrices (two outer on both sides of tail) are good indicators of Eastern origin.
I’ve certainly had two in the garden over the years.

 

[Liverbird37]

Ok, I apologise in advance that these pics aren’t very clear but it’s been a sprightly little thing today. Not sitting still for more than a few seconds. I thought I’d post them anyway in case they do offer some insight. I’ll keep trying to get some better clearer pics if it continues to visit.

 

[Alexander Stöhr]

Hello Ken,
thanks once more for sharing your interesting and helpful images and observations!

And before someone asks about the "overlaid cubic pattern" on the interesting flight shot, please look here: Lesser Whitethroat NEast London

And thanks to Liverbird for your effort to provide more pictures!

 

[Richard Prior]

Is it really possible to identify lesser whitethroat subspecies on the field ?
It seems to me that even with the bird in hand, DNA sample is welcome to confirm ?

It’s become a real minefield Valentin, perhaps you saw this recent discussion: https://www.birdforum.net/threads/t...ws-from-rba-3-59pm-20-jan.435025/post-4427334

 

[Andy Adcock]

Brown tints to nape and head + white outer tail rectrices (two outer on both sides of tail) are good indicators of Eastern origin.
I’ve certainly had two in the garden over the years.

The OP seems to have a solid, white, terminal band?

 

[KenM]

The OP seems to have a solid, white, terminal band?

Don’t know if there’s a lighting issue at play there, believe the dark area (central part of tail) represents the other “bunched” tail feathers and what one see is the white outer tail margins (which it should have) to the two “outer tail feathers?
Hopefully better images might come into play.

Cheers

 

[Andy Adcock]

Don’t know if there’s a lighting issue at play there, believe the dark area (central part of tail) represents the other “bunched” tail feathers and what one see is the white outer tail margins (which it should have) to the two “outer tail feathers?
Hopefully better images might come into play.

Cheers

They look like solid, white tips to me?

 

[KenM]

They look like solid, white tips to me?

Yes, solid white tips to the two outer rectrices.

 

[Richard Prior]

I see what Andy means in the OP and I think the apparent white terminal tail band is due to the fact that the white outer tail feathers are longer than the inner ones, so when the tail is neatly folded like that they (the inner rectrices) don’t reach the tail tip.
I think

 

[KenM]

I see what Andy means in the OP and I think the apparent white terminal tail band is due to the fact that the white outer tail feathers are longer than the inner ones, so when the tail is neatly folded like that they (the inner rectrices) don’t reach the tail tip.
I think

I believe you can see that with my flight image Richard.👍

 

[Butty]

my flight image

The one that's a photo taken of a photo displayed on a screen? - that you have been repeatedly asked not to do?