Parrot Crossbill at Sandwich Bay

October 27th 1990

Rab Morton (Warden)

Around lunchtime on October 27th 1990, as we were doing the last round of the nets on what had been a poor day for catching migrants, Paul Brown, the Senior Assistant Warden, and I found a very big Crossbill in a net in the Elms area of Sandwich Bay Estate. The bird was tentatively identified as a Parrot Crossbill as it had a head and bill which seemed to be totally out of proportion to the rest of its body. The bird was taken back to the Ringing Laboratory where we consulted the latest literature and arrived at the conclusion that the bird was indeed a Parrot Crossbill. The bird's measurements indicated that it was certainly too large to be a Common Crossbill, which was the only other species it could have been. The measurements for both species stated in the literature available are:

Common Crossbill : Wing Length = 91-101 mm, Weight = 33-45 g

Parrot Crossbill : Wing Length = 99-107 mm, Weight = 47-59 g

This bird : Wing Length = 102 mm, Weight = 47 g

It was also noted that the bird had no fat reserves and indeed was quite thin. As the bird was being processed, John Hollyer arrived and was given the bird in a bag and asked what he thought as he had experience of the species in the wild. He had no doubt on seeing the bird that it was a Parrot Crossbill. I took some photographs of the bird before we released it back into the small group of conifers where we had caught it. Bird-Line were informed and in the early evening the first birders started to arrive and the bird was quickly found again. The last group of birders to see it informed me that they had found it feeding on the edge of a road, and as they were watching it was struck a glancing blow by a passing car and was momentarily stunned on the ground. As they ran to see if it was dead it rose shakily ti its feet and flew into the trees where it was seen to go to roost as darkness fell. In the morning it was raining heavily and despite a thorough search by the 25-30 birders present, the bird was not seen again.