Ovenbird, Scilly

Monday 25 October 2004: As was my habit in those days when I worked in the Civil Service, I had booked this day off provisionally, in case any major bird news broke on the Sunday. It hadn’t, so I headed into work that morning as per usual. At about 1.20pm though, mayhem! An Ovenbird had been found under the pines at Trenoweth on St Mary’s on Scilly. My reaction was instant – as I had booked the day off originally, I was leaving! James McGill managed to book three seats on the 4 pm flight from Newquay, though Paul C knew it would be tight for him to make it. I picked Jimbo up and we piled down to Newquay – we made it no problem, but had to work quite hard on the guy on the check-in desk for him not to close check-in before Paul arrived.

Paul made it by the skin of his teeth. Then, while the three of us were in the departure lounge, news broke of an Olive-backed Pipit in exactly the same area – was the ID of Ovenbird in question? We were committed by then anyway to flying and being on Scilly overnight, so we ploughed on. Confirmation that the Ovenbird was real came soon after, but it was a period of doubt we could have done without.

The flight was uneventful, and our taxi was waiting, so we got to Trenoweth before 5 pm, were directed down the right path by birders on scene, and almost immediately were rewarded with stonking views of the Ovenbird. Yeesss! Another successful first-day twitch on Scilly from Somerset!

Unbeknownst to us at the time, three twitchers from Essex had arranged a private flight, using a plane from Blackpool to fly down and pick them up. But the birder known to many as Turtle had already contacted the pilot and wangled himself onto the plane at Blackpool – he had said he and one other would be arriving there shortly. As it was, he arrived later than planned and on his own, so the pilot was late picking up the Essex contingent. They got underway and knew they would make St Mary’s before dark, but by less than they originally thought. At one point Turtle phoned Paul, gleefully saying ‘We’re over Bodmin Moor – we’re going to get there tonight!’ Paul’s response was an absolute deadpan classic: ‘OK, we’ll stay on it till you get here then.’

It was gone 6 pm when we saw the plane overhead, and a little while later again when the occupants appeared. I was out on the main track, foregoing further views of the bird (I’d already had plenty) to direct them in to the right spot under the pines. But when they reappeared not long later, as darkness fell, I found out the Ovenbird had gone to roost less than a minute before they got to the right spot. Disaster!

We saw the Essex contingent later in the Bishop and Wolf for a drink – they were taking it all rather well, I thought, but of Turtle there was no sign all evening. Luckily for him, both he and the Essex boys scored early the next morning. We, on the other hand, had talked their pilot into flying us back to Newquay early morning (before the first scheduled flight), and I was back in work before midday – result!