No Bit of Bread or Cheese ; Nature Watch with Trevor Beer

Summary

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Had to take a second look at the small flock of finches feeding on the ground, goldfinches, linnets and chaffinches and two 'wrong' birds. Binoculars showed they were yellowhammers, a male and a female, so buntings not finches, chestnut rumps showing as they busily sought seeds on open ground near a barn. At this time of year the 'little bit of bread and no cheese' song will not be heard but will begin again usually from February to August. In some areas yellowhammers, or yellow buntings, are known as 'Scribble Larks' from the bold scribble marks on their eggs, usually 3 -4 laid in a nest built by the female. These markings also gave the bird the name Writing Lark and Scribbly and here in the Westcountry, particularly in Devon and Cornwall it is known as Gladdie from the Anglo-Saxon gladde, meaning bright. It is a bird which has certainly caught the imagination of people far and wide with other country names being Yellow Amber, Yellow Yite, Cheeser, Bessie Buntie and Guler. It is thought Guler probably derives from Gulden, an old gold coin of Germany, and yellowhammer was used as a slang synonym for an 18th century gold piece here in Britain.

In Gloucestershire the yellowhammer's song gives it the name 'pretty pretty creature', and in Scotland, 'may the devil take you'. A strange bit of folklore says it drank a drop of devil's blood every May morning.

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No Bit of Bread or Cheese ; Nature Watch with Trevor Beer

How that superstiti...

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