Scarlet in the Isles of Scilly: a species new to Britain and Ireland B. D. Harding At about midday on 4th October 1970, in the Porth Hellick area of St Mary's, Isles of Scilly, I noticed an unfamiliar perched at the top of a dead tree at about 25 yards' range. I called over D. J. Holman and R. E. Turley, but by the time they had arrived the bird had worked its way down into foliage. It soon flew out, however, and during the following ten minutes we and several others watched it at distances varying from 20 to 50 yards, both perched and flying. After this it could not be found again despite a thorough search. We decided that the bird was a member of the tanager family (Thrau- pidae), and from Peterson (1947) concluded that it was a first-winter male olivacea. D.J.H. and R.E.T. subsequently confirmed this identification by examination of skins in the British Museum (Natural History). The bird was also seen by Professor J. D. Craggs, J. H. Johns, N. J. Phillips, E. J. Phillips-Jones, G. H. Price, Dr R. J. Raines and C. W. Westwood. The following is a condensation of field notes taken at the time:

General appearance and behaviour (largely from notes by D.J.H. and R.E.T.): Nearly as big as Corn Bunting Emberi^a calandra but rather more dashing, having a relatively shorter and squarer tail and fairly long, broad, powerful wings. When perched upright it recalled a large finch with a long, stout bill. Once, when it adopted a rather horizontal stance with wings held loosely and drooping slightly, it appeared somewhat like a stocky Sylvia or Hippolais warbler. It usually perched motionless, eventually moving down into cover with a heavy, warbler-like action. The flight was fast and fairly direct, the bird dropping down from foliage, flying along a few feet above the ground, then sweeping up into a bush or tree. On two occasions it was seen to fly- catch—once from the top of a tree, and once from a hedgerow over a field when it covered a distance of 2 5 yards before returning to its perch. In these performances it was very agile, twisting and turning erratically, hovering and almost looping the loop. Plumage: Generally similar to Greenfinch Carduelis Moris but without the yellow flashes in the wings and tail. Head, nape and back rather bright olive-green; lores and ear-coverts darker and greyer (R.E.T.); rump and uppertail-coverts paler and yellower than back; tail dark, greyer than back, 'blackish' (R.E.T.), 'basically greenish' (D.J.H.), very slightly forked. Whole underparts bright lemon-yellow. Wings gave general impression of being greenish-grey, with black patch at carpal joint (lesser coverts); R.E.T. noted blackish outer greater coverts, becoming paler and greener on inner ones, black bastard wing, blackish primaries (as tail), and dark greyish-green secondaries and tertials edged yellow, the edges on the secondaries suggesting a small wing-panel. Soft parts: Bill rather long, stout and conical, slightly rounded at the tip, differently described as greyish or horn-coloured (B.D.H.), flesh-pink (D.J.H.), orange-pink to horn (R.E.T.) and pale or yellowish (R.J.R.); this variation was considered by

155 156 Scarlet Tanager in the Isles of Sally some observers to be due to reflection of the surrounding colours in the shiny surface of the bill. Eyes and legs dark. The determining factor in identifying the bird was the black lesser coverts which contrasted with the paler wings both when flying and when perched. In flight it appeared green above, yellow below, with greenish-grey wings and tail. The only previous records of in Europe are of an adult male P. rubra trapped on Bardsey, Caernarvonshire, on nth September 1957 and present until at least 25th (Brit. , 56: 49-52, plate 12); and a female Summer or Scarlet trapped on Copeland Island, Co. Down, on 12th October 1963 (Copeland Bird Observatory Report for i<)6y. 2-3; see also Ibis, 113: 144). A Yellow-billed Cuckoo Coccy^us americanus was seen in another part of St Mary's on the same day as the Scarlet Tanager, and two days later the first Veery Catharus fuscescens to be recorded in Europe was found at Porthgwarra, Cornwall (Brit. Birds, 65: 45-49).

COMPARISON WITH SKINS On 5th December 1970 D.J.H. and R.E.T. examined skins of Summer, Scarlet and some other tanagers in the British Museum. The first-winter Summer Tanagers were very orange-yellow below and orange-green above, whereas the Scarlets resembled the bird on St Mary's in being lemon-yellow below and olive-green above and in having the black carpal patch that the other species lacks. One Scarlet Tanager in particular, a first-autumn male taken in the U.S.A. in September, was identical in plumage to the bird on St Mary's.

TANAGER IDENTIFICATION The tanagers are a New World family of more than 200 species, but only four occur north of Mexico—Hepatic P. flava, Western P. ludoviciana, Summer and Scarlet. The is unlikely to perform a transatlantic flight due to the restriction of its breeding range to the south-western United States and its short migrations. The exhibits wing bars in all plumages (whereas the Summer and Scarlet do not, though a small percentage of Scarlets have been recorded with wing bars). These two, therefore, are not considered further. Adult male Summer and Scarlet do not present an identification problem: in breeding plumage the latter is bright scarlet with black wings and tail, whereas the Summer Tanager is dull red all over; in autumn and winter the adult male Scarlet is yellowish olive-green with black wings and tail, while the Summer retains its typical dull red plumage throughout the year. Adult females of the two species are somewhat alike in breeding plumage but there are a few differences: the Scarlet is olive-green above and dull yellow below, with dark greyish-brown wings and tail, while the Summer's upper- Scarlet Tanager in the Isles of Sally 157 and underparts are deeper yellowish and its wings and tail paler brownish, tinged olive-green. Juvenile tanagers are heavily streaked below, but this plumage is rarely illustrated in the literature. This streaking is lost during the post-juvenile moult before migration, giving way to what Humphrey and Parkes (1959) called the 'First Basic Plumage'. Birds of both sexes in this plumage, and also adult females in autumn and winter, are very similar. Scarlets have a greenish-olive head and back, greyish- brown wings and tail and pale lemon-yellow underparts; immature males have, in addition, black coverts and sometimes black scapulars. Summer Tanagers have an olive-brown to warm orange-brown back, dull orange-yellow underparts and brownish-green wings; young males, which are generally more richly coloured than females, do not have black coverts. The underwing-coverts are also useful as a guide to identification: the Western and Summer Tanagers have yellow ones, while those of the Scarlet are white. (Data in this section are taken mainly from Godfrey 1966 and Davis 1971.)

RANGE AND HABITAT The Scarlet Tanager breeds in southern Canada and the eastern half of the U.S.A., from south-east Manitoba east to New Brunswick and south to eastern Oklahoma, central Alabama and northern Georgia. It winters in South America from Colombia to Peru and Bolivia. Throughout its breeding range it has a preference for deciduous forests, especially oakwoods. It overlaps geographically with the Summer Tanager in the north-eastern part of the Summer's range, but where this overlap occurs the Scarlet is generally found at higher altitudes, the Summer preferring and woods in river valleys. In the mid-west, where these differences in elevation are less marked, co- occupancy of woodlands is not infrequent. It is there that the possi­ bility of hybridisation cannot be ruled out; in fact, there are several reports of hybrids in the literature. The Western Tanager is a bird of the coniferous forests of the western mountains, but it occasionally strays to the eastern seaboard. The Scarlet Tanager feeds mainly on insects and fruit and spends most of its time in the upper canopy. Despite the vivid plumage of the male it is very difficult to observe in dense foliage, and con­ sequently the best time for watching it is in early spring when it arrives from its wintering grounds. Twigs and rootlets are used in the construction of the loosely built nest, which is lined with grass; it is usually situated well out on a horizontal branch at a height of ten to fifty feet. The three to five eggs, bluish or greenish speckled with brown, are incubated by the female for of 13 or 14 days. 158 Scarlet Tanager in the Isles of Stilly

AC KNOWLEDGEMENTS I am indebted to Dr Kenneth C. Parkes of the Carnegie Museum, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., for his invaluable comments on this subject, and to P. J. Grant and D. J. Holman for their constructive criticism of the draft.

REFERENCES DAVIS, T. H. 1971. 'A key to fall Piranga tanagers—females and immatures'. Eastern Bird Banding Association News, 34: no. 5. GODFREY, W. E. 1966. The Birds of Canada. Bull. Nat. Mus. Canada 203. Ottawa. HUMPHREY, P. S., and PARKES, K. C. 1959. 'An approach to the study of molts and plumages'. Auk, 76: 1-31. PETERSON, R. T. 1947. A Field Guide to the Birds. Boston, Mass.

B. D. Harding, 26 Woodlands Avenue, Houghton Regis, Dunstable, Bedfordshire