Great White over Headington

For a district that is 67 miles from the nearest sea, it seems strange that Headington is associated with sharks. But Bill Heine’s fabulous fiberglass shark, which protrudes 25 feet above the roof of the house he owned in New High Street, is probably the most famous thing about Headington. It also looks pretty good at night too, here pictured with Comet Neowise in the summer of 2020:

I had my own Great White experience in Headington yesterday morning. It was a routine Saturday morning dawn visit to Warneford Meadow and the Lye Valley. Perhaps early spring, if I really squinted hard enough, but really it was late winter. March 5th is slightly too early for the mass of waterbird migration that should kick off from mid-month and will probably pass overhead elsewhere, but as with all local patch birding, you just never know. So I keep going, just in case. A singing Nuthatch and drumming Great Spotted Woodpecker were positive signs many bird species were entering their breeding cycles. Displaying Greenfinches were obvious too, and Chaffinches had recently started singing.

I watch the skies constantly, as nervous as Vitalstatistix, who lived in fear of them falling on his head. My anxiety was not over the impending collapse of the atmosphere, but of missing a migrating bird flying over. Or worse: of only seeing it when it was already too distant to identify. The vast majority of my scans of the sky reveal either nothing or just Woodpigeons. But if you do something enough, eventually something will happen. Or at least, that is what I tell myself.

At 7:23am, I notice a shape in the sky. High above the Churchill Hospital, flying away and slightly east, it has deeply bowed wings and is quite large. I furrow my brow and raise my binoculars, whilst the words “Grey Heron?” begin to form in my mind. The data from my eyes immediately answer this question in the negative – the bird is pure white, above and below. “F**k, it’s an egret” I mutter, whilst quickly swinging my camera around to capture some pictures. Whilst the motor part of my brain works away on the logistics of getting some pictures of a distant white bird flying away from me against a white sky, the inquisitive part of my brain is still wrestling with the identity of this bird, from what I can see through the viewfinder, whilst I take pictures. “Looks big, very deep wingbeats – got to be a Great White?!” I ask myself, without really taking on the meaning of this.

By now, the bird is distant. My camera is not going to help me much more. I put the camera back on my shoulder and go back to a binocular view. The bird is struggling a bit with the stronger gusts of wind and drops down slightly in front of Shotover Hill, before rising again and continuing its journey east. A local Red Kite provides a nice point of comparison as they pass near each other, both birds appearing a similar size in flight.

Finally, I can hardly see the egret anymore, so I turn and review the pictures on the back of my camera. It IS a Great White Egret! The long, dark legs, trailing behind the body are just visible, as are the deeply bowed wing on downbeats:

You can just about make out the yellow bill here and check out the length of those wings:

Wow, what a start to spring 2022, or what an end to winter 2021-22! Either way, this is an amazing record of Great White Egret over Headington, Oxford, and a great incentive to continue dedicated coverage with spring migration just around the corner. What else might fly over before the sky falls on my head?

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