For many birders the Hawfinch is a special bird. A large and
distinctive finch, it is a shy bird of mature woodlands in the UK eating mainly
Hornbeam fruit. Hawfinches used to be a
regular bird in the Stortford area mainly in Hatfield Forest and also in other
local woods, but since the turn of the century this bird has become hard to see
with just a few scattered records mainly from Hatfield Forest and no records at
all for the last few years. Local birders wanting to see Hawfinches have either
had to go to Bramfield Church near Hertford to get one of a handful of wintering
birds, try their luck in the vast expanse of Broxbourne Woods or join the
crowds at the roost at Lynford Arboretum
in Norfolk.
All that changed this autumn with an influx unprecedented in
living memory. On 14th October birders across the south-east started
recording Hawfinches flying over their local patches and watchpoints. Former
Stortford-area birder Stephen Patmore had several birds flying over his new
patch in south London and let Sawbridgeworth birder Mike Harris know Hawfinches
were on the move. Mike immediately drove up to Shingle Hall Farm at Trims Green
on the high ground and soon had a flock of 5 birds flying south – the first local
birds records for a number of years. Whatever the cause of this influx (suspected
to be widespread beech-mast failure in Eastern Europe driving birds to flee in
search of food) this influx has become the principal birding event of the autumn
Hawfinches continued to be seen across the country flying
over watchpoints. As the records continued Mike and I(JS) started wondering if
these birds were not just passing over but settling in woodlands, in which case
were they in Hatfield Forest, the former local stronghold? Hatfield Forest is a
large ancient forest of 4km2 in area. It is a series of discrete coppices with
rides of varying widths between them, and birding in the forest is always quite
a challenge due to the small size of the target birds and dense woodland. We went on 25th October to have a look and chose Wall Wood,
just off the SW corner of Hatfield Forest as a suitable place as the most
recent records were from this area. We saw none in this wood or in the neighbouring
SW corner of the Forest.
Mike learned from Stephen that a favoured area had been
Elgin Coppice on the east edge near Bush End car park where there
were Hornbeams. We returned on 31st October parking at Bush End car park and
headed off to Elgin Coppice. We saw no Hawfinches, and continued on to Elgin car
park. From there Mike saw a small flock of short-tailed Redwing-sized birds way
over on the west side of the forest, so with no better plan we headed over. We
came across a flock of Redwing and Bullfinch feeding on the edge of a
plantation just out the back of the Warren cottage and as we approached Mike
heard a distinctive call and a sausage-shaped bird with white wing-bars flew
out – Eureka! After many blank years Hawfinch was back feeding in the forest. Shortly
after another bird flew out, then two more, and slowly more flew out until we
had nine birds. We decided to head off back to the car park and as we left a further
flock of five flew over and then as we walked across the dam a flock of nine
birds were seen flying north over Gravel Pit Coppice on the eastern bank of the
lake. A total of 23 birds (assuming no duplication).
We put the record on the EBWS site and subsequently many
other birders came to the forest and started seeing and photographing the
birds. It soon became apparent that birds were feeding in Hornbeams between
Bush End car park and Gravel pit coppice by the lake. No criticism is intended in saying that whilst many
birders stayed in this area and had great views of these birds, this gives little information about how many
birds are in the forest in total. Was it just the 23 we had seen? Was it over
a hundred? We had no way of knowing.
We returned with David Sampson on 10th Nov and
went from the car park round the lake and back through Elgin Coppice. We saw a
total of nine birds mainly in the car park / gravel pit coppice area. On 21st MH and JS had a 5 hour walk round the Forest with the exception of the south west section
and saw a total of 30 birds. Birds were seen well in open wooded habitat
north-west of the lake up from London bridge as well as the area near the car
park, and in the early afternoon flying west over the dam area in small groups.
Was there a roost on the western edge? If we found it would we be able to get a
more accurate total for the Forest? On 27th November JS spent the
early afternoon drawing a blank in the only unchecked area of the forest in the
SE corner near the Doodle Oak gate and then went to a likely-looking area in the
centre of the Forest. At 2pm a single bird flew into a tree , then shortly
after another, then at 3 pm five more appeared and went into some deciduous
grees where they sat quietly to be joined by two more. This seemed like
roosting behavior but with just a small number of birds. MH and JS returned on 8th
Dec and saw just a few in this area before fading light and freezing cold meant
we gave up for the day.
What do these observations tell us about the total number of
Hawfinches in the forest? The maximum count is 30 birds. Are there 100 birds? I
consider it unlikely. Extensive looking has not revealed flocks away from the Gravel Pit Coppice/car park area or the central area stretching from the lodge up to the
Portingbury Hills. The roost site did not indicate large numbers of birds
coming in. Also, our experience has been that whilst the calls (now widely known
as being an electric "Tsiipp" settled contact and a flight "tseet" call) are quiet
and brief, Hawfinches are, like Bullfinches, chatty birds that let you know they are
around. Most of our observations started with hearing one of these calls and
then seeing the birds, so I don’t think our blank searching in parts of the
forest will have missed signficant flocks. Other birders have spent considerable time in
the forest judging by the times given on EBWS site records and whilst seeing
many birds have not exceeded the number seen by MH and JS. It is possible that
there are areas of the forest where birds are feeding quietly, or possibly
feeding outside the forest and flying into an undiscovered roost, but I see little
evidence to indicate a maximum number of more than, say, fifty birds.
Mike’s experience as a ringer sheds light on winter finch flocks.
What can seem like a single static flock is often a highly transitory flock
with birds spending only a few days; over-flying birds are drawn in by calls from
the current flock, and others having exhausted the food they can find
move on. So the flock may be variable in number through the winter, and we may
have already seen the peak.
One feature of the interest in the Forest’s Hawfinches is
that a thorough watch of the Forest has taken place. In addition to the
Hawfinches there have been 2 Ravens seen a few times, several Marsh Tits,
maxima of 30 Jay and 24 Bullfinch throughout the forest as well as the commoner
woodland birds. There have however been no records of Lesser Spotted Woodpecker so this
bird continues to be at best very scarce in a former local stronghold.
Just a final personal thanks to Mike Harris for sharing his expertise, patience and enthusiasm in this quest for Hawfinch in Hatfield Forest and for finding the birds that have brought birding happiness to many local birders.
