WHINCHAT (Saxicola rubetra) Tarier des prés
Summary
A not so common bird whose numbers are declining, found mostly in rough meadows above 1300m. Distinctive head pattern and orange breast identify it. The song is a series of short warbles with harsher stridulations thrown in, usually delivered from a song-post. Includes mimicry of a variety of species in its song.
Whinchat numbers have declined steadily over the past 30 years in Switzerland. It is a bird of rough open meadows, with song posts that give a good view of the surroundings, and from which it can dive down onto a prey item, usually an insect. It is a ground-nesting species. Increasing intensity of grassland management, fertilising, early cutting, removal of bushes and small trees etc has changed the habitat structure, reduced insect numbers and early grass cutting destroys nests and kills young. The latest surveys (Knaus etal 2018) tell us that the majority of the population is now only found between 1300-2200m a.s.l, so it occurs mostly on alpine mid-slopes and a few in the Jura Mountains.
© Arlette Berlie
It is easily confused with the closely related Stonechat: also a perky upright little bird, often seen on a fence post or emergent plant stem. Both have an orange coloured breast, but the Whinchat is altogether a more brownish bird, with a dark face bordered by a large white eyebrow above and a smaller white stripe below. This gives it a slightly more “sleek” appearance, as opposed to the “chunky” appearance of the Stonechat. The females of the two need a good looking at though, but again look for the large pale eyebrow. The Stonechat is found at lower elevations in Switzerland, and there is some evidence that where the two meet the Whinchat loses out to its competitor (Cramp et al 1977), so avoiding competition may have something to do with the distribution .
The female also shows the large eyebrow but is a duller colouration. © Arlette Berlie
The song is usually delivered from a song perch which, since it is usually found in rough pasture lands may be a long plant stalk or low bush, but it often will sing from fence posts as well. It is a series of short (1-2 sec) complex strophes, delivered at intervals of 2-3 secs. Here is one in May at 1600m with the last of the spring snow melting away in the background:
It could be confused with the song of a Stonechat but is not as high pitched and “scratchy” as the latter, it sounds more mellow. The Whinchat also uses mimicry in many of its strophes, and that last song certainly seems very similar to phrases delivered by a Robin , have another listen and watch the spectrogram below:
You can also see (and hear!) from the from the spectrogram above that some of the strophes have a harsh chattering in them (1,3,5 and 6). This is another characteristic of the Whinchat, that it can slip in these rattlings almost anywhere amongst more musical notes. See this next one which gives some examples of these rattling sounds both before and after notes which are more musical in each strophe:
So much for the rattling sounds, let us go back to mimicry for a moment. Listen carefully to the above sonogram one more time, and the fourth strophe starts with a “bouncing ball” type of acceleration which sounds very much like the song of a Corn Bunting. If you are sceptical then have a listen to them side by side:
Of course this is not the super level of mimicry shown by its close relative the Common Redstart, but it is still pretty good. It is interesting that it adds its own warbles at the end.
Here is another mimic example where the bird puts two House Martin calls at the start of each strophe, three Whinchat strophes followed by five House Martin calls:
I have not been able to identify more mimicry than this but the literature (Cramp et al 1977) refers to this species being able to mimic a wide range of species.
Finally I have examples of a very harsh “tchak” that follows a strophe, I cannot find other accounts of this, it may be a sign of alarm or discomfort, it is rather reminiscent of the call of the Stonechat, but if you listen carefully through headphones it almost sounds like someone flicking a metallic spring:
Whinchat field sketches from Frank Jarvis diaries
