Song thrush - Turdus philomelos - Family: Turdidae

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Song thrush - Turdus philomelos
© Dr Chris Gibson/English Nature

The song thrush is sometimes confused with the mistle thrush ; but it is smaller, more delicately spotted and lacks white in the tail. It is one of our best songsters, using short, melodic phrases, each repeated two or three times, a fact noted by many poets including Robert Browning. The second part of its 'Latin' (Greek in this case!) name, means 'loving song'. In many areas it is the dominant singing bird in late winter and early spring, and it continues to sing until late summer.

Numbers of song thrush have declined greatly during recent years, at least partly due to more intensive farming methods. The British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) has calculated this fall as 57% over the 31 years to 2001.The use of poisonous pellets to control slugs and snails may pose a threat to garden-dwelling thrushes. Try and find other means of controlling slugs (see the garden tips and the bibliography on this CD for suggestions) if you want these birds in your garden! Song thrushes also eat large numbers of earthworms and are most likely to be seen on lawns, often in the company of blackbirds, a close relative. This makes them especially vulnerable to domestic cats.

As well as gardens, song thrushes inhabit woodland, hedgerows, parks and scrub, preferring habitats where there is a mixture of open ground for foraging and dense vegetation for nesting. The cup-shaped nests are built from March onwards and constructed mainly from grasses, moss and roots. The mud lining separates the nest from the otherwise similar nest of the blackbird.

Nests may be in almost any shrub or tree with a reasonably dense structure, including holly, privet, currant, yew, laurel, hawthorn and blackthorn.

Food

Song thrushes frequently feed on snails which they smash against a stone or hard surface. They also eat earthworms, slugs, caterpillars, other invertebrates and fruit and berries in the winter.

Plants

Apple, Barberry, Bird cherry, Black currant, Blackthorn, Bramble, Buckthorn, Butcher's-broom, Cowberry, Crab apple, Crowberry, Dog rose, Elder, Field rose, Firethorn, Hawthorn, Holly, Honeysuckle, Ivy, Juniper, Midland hawthorn, Mistletoe, Portugal laurel, Rowan, Snowy mespile, Sweet briar, Wall spray, Whitebeam, Wild cherry, Yew

Prey

Brandling worm, Brown-lipped banded snail, Butterflies, Common earthworm, Common garden snail, Garlic snail, Moths, Slugs and snails, Worms

Predators

Carrion crow, Jay, Little owl, Magpie, Sparrowhawk