The Great Bustard Runaround 10th December 2020

Every so often, something in the world of birding comes along that unexpectedly catches my imagination and fires me with an extra shot of enthusiasm.Yesterday it was a Great Bustard, that has found a large stubble field to its liking, next to a public footpath running across farmland at a place called Letcombe Regis, just within the southern border of Oxfordshire. It has been strutting its stuff in its favoured field for around five days but apparently has been in the general area since around the 21st November. Its presence in the easily viewable field has been a real bonus and has allowed me the best views I have ever had of this impressive species.

The footpath from Letcombe Regis to Wantage, looking east with the
field favoured by the bustard to the left

Great Bustards were a native bird of England but in a story, sadly all too familiar, were exterminated by hunting.The last Great Bustard was shot in 1832.

The bustard at Letcombe Regis has a ring on its right leg with the inscription EL 679 and this has enabled it to be identified as coming from the Great Bustard Group (GBG) re-introduction scheme, located on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire and set up in 2004 with the aim of re-establishing a self sustaining population of Great Bustards in England. Currently there are approaching one hundred individuals in the scheme and they are now virtually self sustainable in their Wiltshire stronghold.

The GBG plan is to go forward and establish separate self sustaining populations of Great Bustards in their former strongholds of Dorset, Norfolk and Yorkshire, counties that still retain suitable large areas of open habitat. The bird currently residing in its field in Oxfordshire is doing what they would do naturally and dispersing to find new territory. It is not the first to leave Wiltshire and since the scheme commenced I have seen individual Great Bustards in Somerset, Gloucestershire and even two others in Oxfordshire.

There are those who look askance at the GBG re-introduction scheme but I would counter such scepticism  with the fact that so far White tailed Eagles and Red Kites to name but two species, have been successfully re-introduced to Britain and earlier this year there was the celebrated arrival of the Lammergeier (Bearded Vulture) which so caught the public's imagination and that bird too was from a successful re-introduction scheme in France. So why not Great Bustards? Inevitably such schemes always have their detractors but anything which will counter Britain's ever decreasing biodiversity is to be welcomed in my opinion

In the case of this Great Bustard some birders will say it's not really a wild bird and not worth going to see but again I beg to differ and popular opinion amongst my birding colleagues and the general public supports  my opinion. This bird is living in the wild, finding food and surviving by its own wits and behaving entirely naturally. My personal view is that it is a magnificent bird, well worth making the effort to go and see and I got great pleasure when I did just that. If it remains I will probably go back and have another look as it is only thirty minutes from my home.

Great Bustards are impressively large birds.They are the world's heaviest flying bird with males weighing up to twenty kilos, standing three feet tall and having a wing span of up to eight feet. Looking at this young male in the field I could not fail to be impressed by its size as it moved in stately progress across the stubble field, plucking nonchalantly at the leaves that formed its diet.

Now back to my story.Yesterday I made my first visit and got to the field at just before 8am, a short while after the dawn had broken. The bustard was obvious in the huge field, being the only bird visible and a very large one at that - think turkey size and then some. Initially it stood with its head sunk into its body, breast puffed out and looked thoroughly content doing very little. 

It then roused itself and picked at some more leaves from shoots that were regenerating from an unidentified harvested crop. I took some images and then got chatting to a passer by and whilst distracted the bustard took off! This was not meant to happen but I watched in dismay as it lifted itself on huge black and white wings over some tall trees at the edge of the field and headed east. The surrounding terrain apart from some forlorn trees and hedgerows was rolling hectares of prairie like farm fields not dissimilar from the habitat where the bustard had originated. It could be anywhere. I gave it a try, scattering flocks of chackering fieldfares from roadside hawthorns as I drove around on the surrounding minor roads, scanning the vast fields on either side but it was a hopeless quest.The bird was out there somewhere but beyond any chance of my locating it.

I gave up and drove to Farmoor to meet Amanda, Dave and Phil for our customary walk around the reservoir. Once back in the cafe my RBA (Rare Bird Alert) app told me the bustard was back in its favourite field. I left my friends to go and see it but when I got there it was nowhere to be found. Had it flown off again? The answer was no because RBA had put out the wrong information. The bustard had been located in a different field near a school in Wantage, a few miles east. To add insult to injury by the time I  got to the new location it had commenced flying back to the original  field. 

The light was becoming increasingly dull but I resolved to follow the bustard and make the five minute drive back to the field. Here I found two lady birders standing by the field but I could see no sign of the bustard in the field. I asked them if they had seen the bustard.They laughed and pointed down the narrow footpath and about a hundred metres away the bustard was standing by the path! They told me it had landed on the path much to their surprise and I guess to the bustard's also. It wandered into the field on the other side of the path, looking distinctly confused and took off, ,flying round and over us to land in its original field. I did my best with the camera but it really was getting very gloomy and I knew any images would be a tad grainy.

Note the mud stuck to its feet

The bustard settled itself in the field, looking like it was going to call it a day, as it sunk its head into its shoulders and fluffed out its feathers, preparing for a night just like all the others, stood in the field.

I left for home, resolving to come back first thing tomorrow morning although the weather forecast was not good but then it rarely is at this time of year.

The next morning found me back at the field at just before 7.45. It was cold and raw and the burgeoning clouds confirmed there would be no sun today. A huge swarm of chattering, gurgling Starlings, a thousand  or more strong, were periodically rising from the vast stubble field like some disembodied cloak caught in the wind.They would sweep low and then land once more, a mesmerising living hologram of individual birds, each manoeuvering in perfect synchronicity with its neighbour.

The field where the bustard is usually found

I scanned the field and my heart sank as I could find no sign of the bustard. Just a couple of Carrion Crows strutted in the middle of the field. I looked again and found an indistinct lump much further down the field. Could that be the bustard? The light was still poor and I needed to get closer  and once this was achieved I found that it was the bustard, stood not more than twelve metres from the footpath. Brilliant. I walked down the path until I was right opposite the bird which, as per usual was hunched in repose. I sunk into my warm clothing, the  cold wind blowing on my back.  Each of us stood regarding each other for ten minutes, the admirer and the admired. I took some tentative images not expecting anything half decent but was pleasantly surprised by the images I reviewed on the back of my camera. 

The bustard roused itself and commenced to pluck at the green leaves and swallow them. It wandered slowly across the stubble for a while, then stood and folded its tail into a triangular shape, a mild mimickery of a turkey, the similarity not lost on me. 

Note the large metal ring on its right leg and also the mud clarted to its huge foot

Another twenty minutes had passed when it commenced a bit of light preening to its breast feathers, then looked up and lazily slid out a huge wing in a stretch, slowly closing it and then raising both wings partially above its back before adopting some extraordinary shapes in another extravagant stretching motion as it first extended its head and neck outwards, then bowed downwards whilst retracting its head and neck between half open wings that it brought forward to briefly conceal its head.When these birds display they adopt an extraordinary pose where they almost invert themselves and this looked to be a pale imitation of that.

It settled down to picking at a few more leaves before once more sinking into a period of somnolence. No other birder came to join me and I had the place to myself apart from the occasional jogger and dog walker coming along the footpath. The only time I saw the bustard show concern, and even then it was only mild, was when it caught sight of the dogs, when it would raise its head and neck and move further out into the field.

I looked away to the west and the distant contours of the land were now indistinct, consumed by a shroud of grey, heralding oncoming drizzle that soon caught up with me. The bustard stood unblinking, secure in its insulating feathers and contemplated whatever goes through a bustard's brain if anything. The drizzle although light was irritating and persistent and over the preceding two hours I had achieved everything I desired. I left the bustard hunched in the field and walked back to my car.

What a very pleasant experience with an extraordinary bird. Let us hope it remains for some time yet.

Courtesy of Oxonbirding.blogspot.com/