Reed buntings have returned to the reed beds. They perch on top of a bulrush, its club-like head now crumbling into white seed, or on the top of a small sallow bush growing among the reeds, and they look magnificent. These are the male birds. They have a glossy black head and bib, a white moustache and a white collar. Their back is richly patterned in black and brown, like a Turkish rug.
They mostly leave the reeds in winter, going out into the fields to feed with other buntings and finches. In their winter plumage they are duller, with a brownish head and bib. They come into their splendid new spring plumage by a curious mechanism also found in some other birds. Their heads and bibs are brown in winter because the feathers have brown edges. These edges wear off as time passes — and lo and behold, the rest of every feather is revealed in spring as a gleaming black.
There will be a few other inhabitants of the reed beds in summer, but none that commands much attention. Cetti’s warblers are small brown birds, fairly new to Britain, that have a very loud, rattling song but hardly ever emerge from the depths of the reeds and are far more often heard than seen. Reed warblers are small summer visitors that are also dull brown and flit about inconspicuously. Water rails scream from deep in the reeds but only occasionally come out and plod along the edges of the reed bed.
Unfortunately the song that the cock reed bunting sings from his perch is nothing much to shout about. It is a thin, scratchy “tiz, tiz, tizzy-wiz”, entirely lacking in melody. Before he finds a mate it is delivered quickly and vigorously but on the long summer days when the female is sitting on eggs in the nest he sings more slowly and drearily, often going on for hours at a time.
Nevertheless, perched on a bulrush in his glamorous apparel, looking confidently all round him, there is no denying that the cock reed bunting is always the king of the reed beds.