Nature notes: a roller in Aldbrough

A beautiful and uncommon visitor has been flying around some fields at Aldbrough in East Yorkshire. This is a roller, a bird about the size and shape of a jackdaw. Its head, most of its body and its tail are various shades of sky-blue, its wings are half blue and half black, and its back is cinnamon-pink. It might be thought of as a kingfisher with its colours rearranged. It gets its curious name from its display flight, when it rolls around in the air like a lapwing, its spectacular colours flashing. It is a bird of the eastern European forests, and is also found in southern Spain and southern Italy. It nests in holes in trees, often old holes dug out by green or black woodpeckers. This Yorkshire bird has, in typical fashion, been spending much of its time perched on a post, studying the ground below for passing beetles, and gliding down to catch them. It was still in the same fields yesterday.