Well, not quite as in The Beatles song, as it was 4.30am. Which, in this lightest quarter of the year isn't the dead of night, even if it feels like it to me. And, being warmer now, the window was open so I could hear him singing very clearly.
The good news this confirmed was that I can still hear the dawn chorus. Several years ago, at our last house, I had concluded that age - ok, and maybe too many gigs - had dulled my hearing to the point where I couldn't. I also remember the amusement of several younger employees in my last company who were completely bemused by the fact that I couldn't hear the "test your hearing age" app on our PA's phone. (Hi, Denise!) "What, you mean you can't hear that?!" as it was switched up through the age range from 30 in 5 year steps until it wouldn't go any further. "Very funny!" I said, since it stopped at 60 and I was already 61, though they hadn't all realised that.
At our current house we have more trees and more birds and, yes, wondrously I can still hear them. In particular we have a large fir tree a few yards from the bedroom window and, because of the slope of the ground, we are at blackbird singing height.
And he was giving it large. I say he with certainty because the tree is sparse enough for me to have spotted him - it is, of course, usually a near impossible task to spot a bird singing in a tree unless they perch right on the top - when I've been listening to him at more convivial times of day from my patio. And he's black not brown, so is definitely male. And I've listened as he does a call and reply routine with another bird in a tree not far away, I'd guess about 50 yards, but maybe further.
The blackbird's song is one of the most attractive of British birds. I've read it described as a "combination of melodic verses combined with cheeps and chirrups". I'd describe it as a varied, melodic whistle, of different length and complexity each time (hence "melodic verses"), ending with a brief chatter of shorter notes (hence "cheeps and chirrups"). The ending can, in my experience, identify the individual bird. In our last house we became familiar with an individual blackbird (that would be the case as they are highly territorial) who would sing from our chimney pot or a neighbour's. The song would sometimes end sounding convincingly like a telephone landline. Indeed, Mrs H and I were fooled several times into standing up and making for the house from our decking at this time of year, before saying "damn, it's stopped". Once we realised we soon spotted the culprit, who entertained us through about three seasons. I have read that the main blackbird singing season is March to July, corresponding with mating. And yes, they can mimic.
So I've just been reading up a bit more about blackbirds to see whether the call and reply routine was Mr and Mrs or male rivals. Until recently it seemed to be widely held that bird song was all about males competing to impress the females, who didn't sing. That has been comprehensively rebuffed - I've just watched a female blackbird singing on youtube, if not quite as exhuberantly as a male. I can't be sure but as the male and female - who are monogamous once joined - have adjacent territories, the reply tended to be shorter and the male sings from the nearby tree, I think it's probably his mate replying.
Our blackbird time shares the tree with a robin and a wood pigeon which, of course, has the most boring and repetitive song of all (though I might have got back to sleep more quickly if he had been singing at 0430!) Oh and occasionally some jackdaws, especially when they are taking refuge from their battle with the seagulls, fought out in the sky in front of our house and over the river estuary, which takes place every now and then and is a bit like T.S.Elliott's Pekes and Pollicles poem featured in Lloyd Webber's Cats, though we no longer have a Rumpuscat to sort them out. (I think he'd have drawn a line at a seagull, mind).
Anyway, if you want to hear a blackbird singing, as well as youtube you could also dig out The Beatles White Album and listen to McCartney's Blackbird. Which of course ends with a blackbird singing and very characteristically too. I'd always thought it was just a sad song, especially since Ian McDonald in his tour de force book on all (and I mean all) the Beatles' songs, Revolution In The Head, discounted the idea that it was a metaphor for the civil rights movement in the USA. But Wikipedia gives convincing quotations from Paul McCartney backing up that explanation, including a referenced transcript of a conversation with Donovan from 1968, contemporaneous with the making of the White Album. And also a disarming statement, viewed from 2018, that a "black bird" was a black woman.
Wonderful. A politically impeccable and politically incorrect song at the same time!
If any readers can enlighten me further about blackbirds (not black birds!) please do comment below.
Very interesting Phil
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