A Nightingale from The East 21st October 2025

c Adrian

On Monday the 20th of October Adrian posted on our twitching WhatsApp group an image of an eastern form of a Common Nightingale that had been found amongst a small fall of migrants earlier that day at Rattray Head in Aberdeenshire, Scotland.

It is only the fourth record ever of this form in Britain and one has not seen here since 1991.

He enquired if any of us were interested in going for it and advised he could leave that evening.

Currently not a species as such but classed as a sub species of Common Nightingale it may bc designated a separate species in the future and consequently has stimulated some interest amongst the twitterati. Personally I regard it as an interesting bird to see and for me it is not all about adding another tick to my list but also deriving great pleasure from seeing and appreciating a bird of which I have no experience and just enjoying it.

Having decided I would like to see it, I contacted Adrian and made a two and half hour drive to his house in Essex to team up with him. Two other birding colleagues, Les and Paul (is there not a famous guitar maker going by that name?) being the final two  to make up a four in Adrian's car; Les being subsequently picked up from Epping and then Paul from Bar Hill in Cambridgeshire. All went to plan and we set off into the night heading for the northeast of Scotland.which seemed  very distant and daunting prospect to be undertaken on a Monday night

Rattray Head lies well beyond Aberdeen and it would take nine hours driving to get to our destinatiion with a scheduled arrival time of 6.30am if all went well.

Sitting in the passenger seat talking to the driver for nine hours throughout the night is not to be recommended and is nigh on impossible anyway but apart from occasional lapses into sleep on my part this is what has to be attempted

A couple of comfort stops at various motorway services on the way was all we allowed. Just as well as is there anything more depressing than the sense of abandonment and desolation that comes on entering an empty services at 2am in the middle of the night. Never am I more keen to flee the blaze of neon and return to the comfort and cocooned warmth of the car. 

Inevitably one slips into a kind of transcendent state staring at the onrushing road as the conversation and things to talk about dry up but we managed to converse fitfully and finally found ourselves north of Fraserburgh with just half an hour's driving to go to get to the appointed location. The night was clear, with many stars visible and gloomily we speculated how this might have encouraged the bird to migrate but we had now committed ourselves to this latest gamble and could but await the dawn to reveal our fate. We would know soon enough as the sky began to visibly lighten to the east of us.

Still in virtual darkness we turned off the tarmac road and drove down a narrow potholed track in the middle of nowhere but even at this early hour encountered a runner  heading in the same direction as ourselves.We kept going until we came to a grassed parking area with the top of the iconic lighthouse beaming out its warning pulses of light beyond the dunes that lay in front of us.

A distinct feeling of denouement came over me. It is always this way on being the first to arrive at a twitching destination and as confirmation that the whole journey will be rendered pointless or otherwise rapidly approaches.

There was one other birder's car in the parking area plus a tractor already running its engine and by the looks of it being repaired by a mobile mechanic. At this early hour? The time was now approaching 6.45am.

Above the parking area on a rise to our right were two large houses, currently bulky shapes in the darkness, one with a light on. One was occupied, the other not.

The occupied house according to local knowledge is rented by a rather truculent man who had the previous day lambasted birders who had come to see the nightingale and been thoroughly unpleasant throughout.So much so someone had reported him to his landlady who had told him to treat birders with respect and courtesy rather than shout and swear at them.

This had the reverse effect and made him even more objectionable!

So this morning it was like treading on eggshells but as it was still dark there was no sign of him but only the two friendly men attending to the tractor.

We sat in the car awaiting the dawn which was soon upon us and getting our stuff together stepped out into a cold dewy morning and speculated where the nightingale might be if it was still here.

In the half light a bird sat silhouetted on a fence It could be the nightingale or it could be a Robin. A feature of the nightingale was that it wagged its tail up and down distinctively and this bird did just that but there was not enough light to tell for certain what it was.

The bird disappeared and as the light increased we saw it or another nearer, in some gorse lower down the rise and to much rejoicing found it was our bird, looking very grey in the dawn but definitely the bird as it sported a rufous tail and crown.

The light was improving all the time and the bird showed intermittently but regularly in various bushes, gorse clumps and small bare trees for around half an hour before disppearing into a large area of gorse at the top of the dunes

For almost forty five minutes there was no sign of it but eventually it re-appeared from the gorse and moved back to its original location, lower down by the our parked cars. 

We all got some photos of sorts and although the bird was skittish it would regularly show well.

It breeds widely across central Asia from the Aral Sea across Kazakhstan to western China and winters in East Africa mainly in coastal Kenya and Tanzania. the bird I viewed today was slightly larger than 'our' Common Nightingale and noticeably longer tailed. The upperparts were sandy grey rather than a warm brown and contrasted strongly with its long rufous tail which it cocked frequently, a feature and action we all remarked upon as it seemed so different to a 'normal' Common Nightingale. It also showed obvious pale edges to its tertials, median and greater wing coverts forming clear wing bars.The plumage structure and behaviour was to me reminiscent of a Rufous Bush Robin.

Other birds were here too, some passing through this isolated lonely area throughout the morning, others tarrying for a while. Up to five Blackcaps fed in the gorse bushes and Goldcrests were constantly arriving from the nearby North Sea, flickering through the gorse and then were gone inland. A huge flock of Pink footed Geese squealed their way down from the sky onto an adjacent area of fallow land before taking alarm and departing at high volume. A lone White fronted Goose was amongst them.

The grating calls of migrant Bramblings fell from the sky, presumably the birds were arriving from a sea crossing and voicing their relief at making dry land and very pale Chiffchaff but not quite pale enough to be of the Siberian race examined a bare willow.

For the first hour of daylight we were virtually on our own but gradually other birders came until there were around twenty of us.

At noon we decided we had seen enough. Everyone of us content.The Nightingale meanwhile had flown back to the large clump of gorse at the top of the dunes and looked unlikely to emerge from its dense, green, prickly fastness for some time.

It was time to go and we drove back towards Aberdeen finding  small parties of Yellowhammers, Corn Buntings and Tree Sparrows, feeding and bathing on the potholed track as we made our way back to the road.

Rattray Head Lighthouse