Onomatopoeia

On a recent walk through some local woods, I was aware of how all of us including some very experienced bird watchers relied on our ears before our eyes to identify the denizens of the trees.

The distinctive and surprisingly loud, pew pew pew of the nuthatch alerted us all long before it was spotted as did the repetitive tsee tsee tsee of the siskins.

Everyone knows the yellow-hammer's refrain of "a little bit of bread and no chee-eese" and, to my mind, the chaffinch sounds like a fast bowler approaching the crease - a few stuttering notes, then an accelerating run then a flourish of cheewoo on the delivery.

I downloaded an app on my i-pod which allows me to record a song for 30 seconds then have it analysed and identified. It has its limitations; it failed a trial of naming a buzzard from its unmistakable call but is usually pretty accurate.

I've just finished the Diaries of a Dying Man, the last work of the poet William Soutar.  His ankylosing spondylitis eventually made him bedridden for fourteen years from 1930 until his death in 1943.   His contact with the natural world was confined to his garden, mostly viewed through a bay window but his enforced immobility allowed him to become a wonderful recorder of the passing scene.

 He had a great affinity for the blackbird.  He compared it to the thrush whom he saw as a provincial country cousin compared to the masterful creation of the blackbird with its " solitary bright bill against the body's darkness"

...life's joy culminated in a single gesture- the flirt of a tail feather; and the magnanimity of life flowing in the rich simplicity of a song.

 Another entry has a blackbird whistling in the rain " the Caruso of the tribe"

I could have listened to him for hours, the interplay of notes was so varied, defiant, witty, confident, merry, bold - anything but melancholy.

This from a man with a poet's ear for sound in rhythm and rhyme.

He attempted, but admitted it was well nigh impossible, to translate the song into words.

chickee-chickee-chee: ti-ti-ti-titty-titty: chittie-cheea: tweeto-tweet-tweeto: what-ya-doin', what-ya-doin': hullo-hullo-hullo: chejoey-chejoey-what-what-what: gee-up, gee-up, hoo-hoo-hoo: get-away, get-away, get-away: you-would, you-would, you-would, would-you?: hoi-hoi-hoi-- have-a-look-at -me.

The sheer volume and exuberance of the blackbird's song make it difficult for the amateur bird watcher to distinguish the others joining in the chorus though the robin and humble dunnock try their best.  Thankfully, the wonderfully ascending scales of the sky lark only have the wind to outdo. 

The comforting cooing of the wood pigeon; the privilege of hearing the barn owl's screech or the tawny owl's hoot in the stillness of the night; the assurance of summer in the cuckoo's mocking call or the scream of the swifts on warm evenings: sometimes we are scarcely aware of them amongst all the noise we generate.

 We should rejoice in their presence.