Great Grey Shrike

Lanius excubitor

Great Grey Shrike

The great Grey Shrike is a rare visitor to Scotland whilst on passage with about six birds a year seen, mostly on the east coast. I count myself lucky therefore to have seen one on Mullinavardie. I had seen them in Spain and therefore recognised the upright stance that they adopt whilst perched high is a tree. In this case it was in one of the birch trees next to the road between Trinafour and Kinloch Rannoch. As the Great Grey Shrike is a rarity in Scotland I notified Ron Youngman who was at the time Bird Recorder for Perthshire and he was able to come to Mullinavardie and see the bird too.

The Shrike is a song bird with unusual behaviour in that it preys on small vertebrates such as mice, voles, shrews, small birds, lizards, frogs and toads. It also eats invertebrates. When the prey is larger (and they have even been known to kill and eat a young stoat) they impale the animal on a thorn in order to be able to dismember it. Their feet are not strong like a raptor and so they cannot grip the prey with their feet except to carry it a short distance after it is dead. The prey is killed by thumping it on the skull with the heavy beak.

Sometimes small birds are caught in flight when the Shrike flies up underneath and grabs the feet of the prey in its beak.

Prey may be stored in a ‘larder’ which is a thorn bush where the macabre sight of a number of animals impaled in the thorns may be seen. It is usually tadpoles rather than adult frog or toads that are eaten but a Shrike has been witnessed to impale a toad and remove the toxic skin before dining. The shrikes may also leave toxic creatures such as some grasshoppers for a few days in order to render them edible.

There is an interesting association with fieldfares. The two species cooperate to drive off or warn about predators. The shrikes seem to abstain from eating the fieldfares nestlings.

Creative Commons - credit Marek Szczpanek