What to record in October - fieldfare

Approximately 720,000 fieldfare winter in the UK. Are there any in your area yet?

When should I start looking?

Fieldfare will start to arrive in October and stay in the UK until March, when they will go North to breed. Fieldfare presence will be dependent on weather conditions and available food supplies.

Recording fieldfare for Nature’s Calendar

1. We need to know when you first see a fieldfare this autumn, to support our existing dataset for arrival date in the UK.
2. See our fieldfare page to find out more about how to identify this bird and what other species it can easily be confused with.
3. Fieldfare commonly feed in areas with high numbers of berries, such as hawthorn hedges, upon first arrival. When these are depleted they will move into more open farmlands later in the season, which is too late for our records.
4. Good news for the birds, our current records for 2017 indicate that hawthorn on average has had a good crop this year!

Interesting Fact
The name fieldfare might date back to the eleventh century. It is thought the Anglo-Saxon word feldefare meant traveller through the fields.

Fieldfare desktop wallpaper
Use our fieldfare desktop wallpaper to remind you what to look out for this month.