Forster’s Tern – Magnolia Warbler – Greater-short-toed Lark

August 2023 was a good month for seeing new birds, or ‘lifers’ as they are known in the birding world. First there was the Forster’s Tern down at Arne in Dorset.

This is a rare North American vagrant to our islands and had been around for a few months. It’s more of an inland tern on freshwater pools and marshes and is similar to the Common Tern but with a longer tail. Non breeding birds have a distinct black eye patch which makes it readily identifiable, the bird at Arne was one such example. It was in with Black-headed Gulls and the odd Sandwich Tern and luckily for us was on a spit not too far from a viewing area.

As it had been around for a good number of weeks there weren’t many there, the ‘twitch’ had well and truly passed. It was named after Johann Reinhold Forster (22 October 1729 – 9 December 1798) who first recognised that it differed from the Common Tern.

Then there was the really stunning Magnolia Warbler, originally named the Black-and-Yellow Warbler by Alexander Wilson in 1810, but given a scientific name after the bush he collected it from – Setophaga magnolia – however, the ‘Magnolia’ has won out and become the name it is known as today.

This was only the third record for the UK and therefore quite a significant ‘twitch’ I had to go twice before seeing this one. The first evening I missed its only very brief appearance as I had excused myself for wee!!! So back to Briton Ferry early the following morning. Only one other birder there when I arrived but a lot more were to come, some from far afield. As with the Forster’s Tern the Magnolia Warbler is an American vagrant and was bought over here on some strong Atlantic gales, along with other American passerines. It was seriously elusive and not all there got a look at it. I was fortunate that it showed briefly early on.

Finally a much seemingly duller but very subtle Greater Short-toed Lark turned up. This one not from the Americas but southern Europe and north west Africa across Turkey and southern Russia into Mongolia. So this bird was well out of its range. It had turned up on Dale airfield in Pembrokeshire. It took a while to hook up with, but once we had, it gave good views flying off across the local fields before returning to the disused airfield every half hour or so.