Birds New to Britain and Ireland

Poyser Monographs

by J.T.R. Sharrock, P.J. Grant

First-sighting accounts of 83 species unrecorded in Britain and Ireland before 1946. Identification notes by Peter Grant.

280 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 1983

About the author

John Timothy Robin Sharrock (b. 1937) is a British ornithologist and author .

Reviews

[Stephen Dunstan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked this up in a second hand bookshop as I like reading finder's accounts. Unfortunately I don't think this one has aged well. The main reason for this is that the accounts follow a fairly standard format having been published originally in British Birds, which is factual and lacking any emotion. A number of the accounts read 'saw unusual bird, thought it was x, managed to coax it into a hastily set up net, bird in hand was indeed x'. The identification notes by Peter Grant are obviously thorough but a recent field guide would be more use in this regard with changes in taxonomy over the years.

If you do read it one or two things to be aware of (this list is only off the top of my head):

- the opening account of Moustached Warblers has since been deemed not proven and the species is not on the British list
- the strange flocks of Lesser Short-toed Larks in Ireland have since been deemed not proven and the only record since in Britain is up in the air because the species has been 'split' and its not clear which of the new species it was
- the Spectacled Warbler was actually a Subalpine Warbler but the species has occurred since
- those of a sensitive disposition may wish not to read the Bonelli's Warbler account

It is however interesting to see how some of the species have never occurred again or remained very rare whilst others have turned up many times. In some cases like Wilson's Phalarope it's rather inexplicable why the first one took so long to be seen.