Finders-in-the-Field: Western Orphean Warbler, Lothbeg Point, Highland, Oct 2020
My plan for Saturday the 10th October was to check out some patches of trees and scrub north of Embo and work my way back home for lunch before walking out to Dornoch Point. The forecast was for sunshine with blustery showers from the SW, not ideal conditions for searching for migrants on the east coast of Sutherland, not that we are especially well placed for seeing them as most occur to the north and east of us.
The morning started well, with a Yellow-browed Warbler near Helmsdale in calm, sunny conditions. As I called in to my next patch the wind had got up and it started to rain, with five male Bullfinch eating rowan berries being the only highlight. Next stop was Lothbeg Point, where there is a sheltered embankment covered in gorse with a scattering of elder trees. In the past I have only found Blackcap, Chiffchaff and Goldcrest here, so not exactly a migrant magnet. It was now raining heavily as I walked below the embankment locating a few Robin and a skulking Dunnock. As I walked back a movement in a small elder tree half way up the bank caught my eye, it was a female type Blackcap, just behind it obscured by branches I saw another small greyish bird with a black head, male blackcap I thought. Then as it moved I saw the black on the head was covering the eyes and it had a white throat, then it vanished. Now with alarm bells ringing I needed to see this bird again. I stayed on the spot for an hour in the pouring rain but saw no further sign of the bird.
I messaged Bob Swann around 12:30 and gave him a description of what I saw. Bob offered to come up and help look for the bird but I said it may just be a Lesser Whitethroat so best wait to see if it reappears. A few minutes later it popped up in the furthest elder to my left and in the split second I saw it I had enough to rule out Lesser Whitethroat, so I messaged Bob again. I told him it wasn't a Lesser Whitethroat but looked “Sardinian like”. It did not show again till just after Bob arrived when we both had a very brief view of it in the closest Elder before it vanished back into the gorse. At 14:40 it was back in the Elder. I had my bridge camera ready on full zoom so when it finally moved out onto the edge of the tree, I managed some record shots before it disappeared into the gorse. A few minutes later I put a photo on the local WhatsApp group. Then my phone went into overdrive with all the messages “Dean it’s got a pale eye” “Dean it’s an Orphean”. This was not on my radar at all! In the dull conditions in the field we could not pick out the pale eye and the head looked all black. So now we were looking at an Orphean Warbler but which one?
Peter Stronach then arrived and confirmed from my photo that the bird was indeed an Orphean. We had a few more brief views, then next on the scene were Keith and Rosie Barnes. Keith had a decent camera and managed to get a few good shots of the bird showing detail that was hard to see on the brief field views we had been getting, which had not been helped by the poor weather conditions. Importantly he managed to get some shots of the plain, buffy undertail coverts confirming that it was infact a Western Orphean – only the third record for Scotland. Now happy the bird had been positively ID’d I decided to call it a day after five hours in the rain. As I was leaving a few other Highland birders began to arrive at the site. Thankfully the rain stopped and the bird started to show well giving everyone great views of the critical ID features.
Next morning Peter Stronach was back at first light and put the news out that the bird was still present. Peter managed to get some fantastic shots in much improved conditions compared to the previous day and many visiting birders were treated to some lovely views of a much more obliging bird!
Dean Macaskill
19 October 2020
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