White-throated needletail seen for first time in 34 years

A rare bird has been spotted in England for the first time in 34 years.

The white-throated needletail was seen at Yorkshire Water’s Tophill Low Nature Reserve in Driffield by visitors Mandy Gregory and Ray Maddison on Wednesday 8 October.

The bird is a native of East Asia and Australia and a relative of the UK’s native swift species, thousands of which feed on insects over the reserve’s reservoirs every year.

Richard Hampshire, lead nature reserve adviser, said it was “probably the second-rarest bird to appear in 60 years at Tophill Low”, after an Amur falcon was seen in 2008.

Mr Hampshire said the visitors told him they were “at first unsure of what it was, with its long sabre-shaped wings and bullet-shaped body”.

“They brought the images to me in the warden base and we quickly realised it was a very special and rare visitor for the UK,” he said.

“We got the news out on social media and became inundated with messages and calls. We had about 50 people turn up to the reserve within the hour,” he added.

Yorkshire Water said it was the first time a white-throated needletail had been seen in England since 1991, and the second time it has appeared in Yorkshire after it was previously spotted near Ferrybridge, West Yorkshire, in 1985.

The white-throated needletail was also spotted at RSPB Bempton Cliffs in Bridlington, East Yorkshire, on the same evening, the company said, where hundreds of people gathered to catch a glimpse of it.