THE BIRDS OF SOUTH GLOUCESTERSHIRE
YELLOW-BROWED WARBLER – Phylloscopus inornatus
Found by: R. Reader.
Fig. 1.
Fig. 2.
Old Passage, October 2001: © P. Bowerman.
FIELD DESCRIPTION
Stopping at midday for a “quick look” around the trees and bushes at Old Passage, near the, now derelict, Aust Ferry Terminal I was immediately “confronted” by a small phylloscopus warbler, showing a bold pale yellow supercilium, black line through the eye, and two pale yellow wing bars. Realising I was looking at Severnside’s first Yellow-browed Warbler, and that the “locals” would like to see it, I phoned Paul Bowerman with the news and asked him to relay it to others.
The bird then flew up into the canopy of the larger trees, and was chased off, over the road, by a Chiffchaff. The Water Board then arrived with a large lorry, compressor, and pneumatic tools and proceeded to fill in a large hole in the road, the noise was unbelievable. After two hours they eventually left, and thirty minutes later the bird was relocated calling from the hawthorns, and a small sycamore, where I had first seen it earlier.
DESCRIPTION
As can been seen in Fig.1 the upperparts are olive-greenish, and the under parts are whitish. The two pale yellow “wing bars” can also be seen, more conspicuous on the greater coverts. Not so obvious from Fig.1 are the tertials which were dark almost black with thin white fringes, and white tips. The bold pale yellow supercilium and black line through the eye can be seen in Fig. 2. Also, there is no central crown stripe on the head, as shown by Pallas’s Warbler.
Bill:- Dark with paler fleshy base.
Legs:- Brownish.
Size:- Slightly smaller than the harassing Chiffchaff.
Call:- A quite loud, Coal Tit-like “tswee-eee” most often with an upward inflection and repeated several times in a rapid sequence
(making relocation easy).
Jizz:- A typical small, very active phylloscopus.
There was nothing to suggest the bird was other than the nominate race inornatus. Humei would show a whiter supercilium, and wing bars, greyer upperparts, and a call more of a disyllabic tsee-yeep or pseee-up.
Acknowledgement:- Thanks are due to Paul Bowerman for photographing this very active bird.
Dick Reader - October 2001.