Singing Nightingale

The arrival of the Nightingales in the Spring means that the air will be dominated by their song for the next month or so. Competing males, attempting to attract a female into their territory by out vocalising their neighbour.

Despite being a bird whose numbers have dropped dramatically over the years, the area of Essex I live in is one of their few strongholds and they can be heard in good numbers from a number of locations.

Despite this they can be extremely difficult to see. Even though their loud and unrelenting song gives you a good idea of where they are, they have an uncanny knack of obscuring their view from every possible angle in areas of deep bushes.

In my experience looking for them over the years, every now and then you find an individual that is a lot more showy and will sing more out in the open than the rest. Luckily for me that happened quite early on and I managed to capture a short video of a singing male. I didn’t take any photos of it because they would only be selling the bird short by not showcasing its most redeeming asset in all its glory.

The footage isn’t the most steady in the world because I was zoomed in a fair distance. The fact that the bird caught me off guard, staring straight at me, meant that I daren’t move a muscle to support the camera more efficiently, in fear of scaring it off. I figured that shaky footage would be preferable to no video at all.