Nature is calling: Hunt down a “butcher bird” that pierces its prey – also known as a great gray shrike

It’s one of those days when the sun never really beats the twilight and the drizzle.

We are in the Hothfield Heathlands Nature Reserve in Kent and it is so gray that the only warmth comes from the burnt orange of the leaves.

What brought us here is the hope of seeing a great gray shrike. These masked bandits and hook-billed bandits are known as butcherbirds because they impale their prey on thorns in their “larder” — prey that includes beetles and small mammals or reptiles.

These are rare winter visitors to the UK – less than 100 stay and only a few make it through again. They prefer moors such as this one near Hothfield, where the hoped-for bird was first reported two weeks ago during our visit on 10 November.

The reserve is heathland and moorland, the only example of its kind in the province. It consists of gorse and heather, silver birch, alder and oak.

Upstairs everything is gray, but below the brown oak leaves form a carpet on the floor. Red-stemmed Salix seedlings grow on the wet meadow. The yellow gorse flower lingers. The grass is bright green and the bracken is burnt ginger.

The birch and alder bushes are cleared with heavy machinery which, if left unchecked, would turn the place into a forest. Vital habitat and its species would be lost. The forest would drain the peat, with the peat returning carbon to the atmosphere.

Konik ponies graze alongside Highland cattle, both of which help hold back the undergrowth. The cattle are the same color as the trees closest to their trap.

As the days get shorter and gloomier, the leaves produce less chlorophyll, which gives them their green color and converts daylight into energy.

And as the green fades, the orange and yellow tones emerge. In a way, the leaves don’t turn brown, but their inner “brownness” comes out.

In some trees and under certain conditions — more late-season sunlight, less rain — there are changes in the levels of another chemical, anthocyanins. These are created when the tree tries to squeeze the last bit of energy from the annual sun. When this happens, the leaves turn red.

We stay in Hothfield for three hours until dusk turns into dusk. We don’t see the constrictor – nor are there any more reports for the next few days – but there’s warmth between the haze and the color beneath the gray. The day has not been in vain.