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sentinel, resplendent in its smart black, white and grey uniform. Despite never having seen one before, we immediately knew it was a Great Grey Shrike, a scarce winter visitor from Scandinavia. It sat for a few moments, then flewaway, never to be seen again. But what made the experience really special was that we had found the bird ourselves, away from the classic birding sites and without the guidebook.
    A gull too far
    JUNE 1996
    Ross’s Gull is one of the world’s most mysterious birds. It breeds in the remote Siberian tundra and winters in the Arctic Ocean, rarely venturing further south. Which doesn’t explain what one was doing at an English south coast holiday resort back in the summer of 1974. But that’s birds for you – always unpredictable.
    I was on my first ever ‘go-it-alone’ holiday with my classmate and birding companion Daniel. In those days, despite only just having turned 14, we were allowed to get on our bikes and head vaguely in the direction of Hampshire. Loaded down with tents, primus stoves and other camping equipment, our plan was to spend a week away, discovering the ornithological delights of the New Forest.
    Things went pretty well at first, and we managed to avoid the juggernauts and speed maniacs, and survived to pitch our tent. Too young to pass for 18, the local pub was out of bounds, so after cooking a meal bordering on the inedible, we retired to the tent for a night’s sleep.
    We spent the next two or three days in an agreeable routine of getting up, having breakfast and birdwatching until we became too tired or darkness fell, whichever came first. On the third or fourth day, we were wandering around the coastal marshes at Keyhaven, and not seeing very much, when we met a fellow birder.
    â€˜Anything about?’ we enquired, in the time-honoured manner.
    â€˜Not really – except the gull, of course,’ he replied.
    â€˜The gull?’
    Remember, this was long before the days of rare-bird phonelines,personal pagers and all the other hi-tech aids to modern twitching. It turned out that a Ross’s Gull, only the eleventh ever recorded in Britain, was still present about 20 miles along the coast, at Stanpit Marsh near Christchurch.
    There was nothing else for it. We got on our bikes and went for the bird. Unfortunately, being a sunny summer Sunday, a large share of the population of southern England had also decided to visit Stanpit Marsh, which as well as being a good birding spot also boasts a beach.
    We waited. And waited. And eventually gave up, and endured the 20-mile ride back to our campsite – tired, hungry and frustrated. But we weren’t the sort to give up that easily. Next morning we remounted our bikes and made the long trek back to the marsh. Once again we joined the small band of eager observers perched on a sandbank.
    At five past eleven, just as my stomach was beginning its usual protests, the guy sitting next to us asked quietly: ‘Is this it?’ We turned and looked. On the water, a hundred or so yards away, sat a small, delicate gull, its pearl-grey back contrasting with a pure white head and neck, bisected by a thin, dark line. As I focused the bins, it flew – a creature of rare grace and beauty among its commoner cousins. It was the Ross’s Gull.
    Twenty years later, on an unusually mild February morning, I stood with a group of twitchers by the sewage outfall at Inverness, watching another Ross’s Gull. In those intervening decades, twitching has become a popular participation sport, with thousands of people racing up and down the country in search of rare birds.
    I don’t begrudge their enjoyment but do feel that perhaps they’ve taken some of the magic out of birding. I have occasional pangs of nostalgia for the days when you only heard about a rare visitor by being in the right place at the right time. And when catching up with the bird itself really meant something.
    Incidentally, in