Subalpine Warblers used to be just that, one species fits all. I've talked about splits and lumps often enough, so won't repeat myself. The long and short of it is that there are now three species:
- Eastern Subalpine Warbler
- Western Sublapine Warbler
- Moltoni's Warbler.
All three occur in the UK, with the latter the rarest and the other two frequent. I'd twitched a Moltoni's in Norfolk in June 2018, and have doubtless seen multiples of the others given that Subalps are more scarcities than rarities. ID is straightforward for spring males, but far less so for females and autumn immature birds. Unfortunately in recent years I've only seen autumn immatures and my older records of spring males are mostly not well enough documented to be able to distinguish.
So for now I've had 'Subalp sp.' on the list (as well as Moltoni's), but for the last few springs I've meant to chase down spring males of the Eastern and Western make. An easy tick opportunity not to be ignored, but one that there was no hurry for.
So when a singing male Eastern bird was found at Spurn on the evening of 27th May I made plans to set-off on news the next day. And so it played out. Simple journey and walk to chalk bank. It took a while to show but eventually showed very well. Super little bird too.
EASTERN SUBALPINE WARBLER OML (556).
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| Images by Brian Martin and Karen Jayne |
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