Its the dull ones you have to watch!

In one of my bird guides, the Corn bunting is described as “one of the larger and certainly the most nondescript of the European buntings”.  Compared to its jazzier cousin, the yellowhammer, it is quite dull but I have a certain amount of affection for this ‘fat bird of the barley’ as its sometimes known. Its unexciting looks hide a racy side to the Corn bunting; the males are polygamous, often having several mates and nests on the go simultaneously. It is one of the earliest farmland birds to start singing and if you are out on top of the West Wiltshire Downs this month you may hear its jangling song, sometimes likened to a rattling bunch of keys, being sung from a fence post or solitary hawthorn bush. It is a very distinctive sound, another reason why I like it – you can’t mistake it for other bird calls! When disturbed they will fly off from their post with their legs dangling – another telltale corn bunting trait.



Corn bunting on a song post (Copyright Wessex Wildlife)

 

Corn bunting are birds of open country favouring large fields where they nest on the ground, most often in cereal crops or sometimes pasture but always away from trees and tall hedgerows. Curiously for a bird that starts singing in January to establish territories, they nest late, often having flightless chicks in the nest in late July which can mean they fall prey to the combine harvester, particularly if they nest in winter barley which is harvested earlier than other crops like winter wheat. Grass fields cut for hay or silage present a similar problem.



Corn bunting nest on the ground. Copyright Hugh Morrison

 With support from the South Wiltshire Farmland Bird Project, any farmers across the AONB are providing safe nesting areas for the birds by growing large blocks of unharvested cereals in open areas of the farm; these also deliver much needed seed food over the winter. Planting flowering plants like knapweed, red clover and lucerne increases insect numbers ensuring sufficient summer food for the chicks.  We are extremely fortunate in Wiltshire to have good numbers of corn bunting; unfortunately they have declined considerably in other parts of the UK (by 90% between 1970 and 2012 although this decline has slowed since 2007). Sadly, in Scotland they are in danger of disappearing completely. So pull on your coat and gloves and head up to the West Wiltshire Downs or the Ox Drove above the Chalke Valley and see if you can spot this charismatic little bird.