Tim writes: Pied Flycatcher is quite a scarce bird in my local area so I was quite pleased to find one near Holmfirth. I mentioned it to a friend, who went to look and found three. As the weather was good I decided to go back and try for a photograph and this was my best effort. It is a young bird, hatched this year, but has already undergone its post-juvenile moult in order to lose most of its scaly feathers. Those pale feathers in the median coverts form a pale upper wing bar which identifies it as a young bird. Intriguingly it also has a ring, but I cannot quite read the number.
I was quite surprised to learn how rare the Pied Flycatcher was during the nineteenth century. The Rev F O Morris in a History of British Birds 1850-57 wrote “with us it is very local, and like the majority of ornithologists, I have never seen it alive“. It was largely confined to North Wales and the Lake District, with no breeding records at all from the Peak District, where it is now common. It is also a bird that was so rare it is almost devoid of local folk names. Thomas Pennant coined the name Pied Flycatcher in 1778 but prior to that was known by its then German name of Coldfinch.
In springtime males sing and display to attract a female but the females hold out as long as possible for very good reason. This is because females build the nest and incubate the eggs, but while they are preoccupied the male will sometimes go off and find a second or even third mate. But the male does catch insects to help rear the chicks, but if his attentions are divided the success rate is lower. Just say a female can rear three chicks with the exclusive help of a male, but only two chicks if a male divides his labours between two nests. But this would mean a male could rear four chicks from two nests but only three from a single nest. So it is in the male’s interest to have a second nest. But it is not in the female’s interest to share him as she will rear fewer chicks. This is why the female holds out as long as possible, as the longer she makes him wait, the more likely it is that other females will be paired up, so she will have his sole attention. A true battle of the sexes.
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