By Graeme Strachan

BIRD ENTHUSIASTS have reacted with horror after watching two very rare visitors to Tayside die in tragic circumstances.

Birdwatchers from the Dundee RSPB local group were celebrating after spotting a red-rumped swallow flying around at Lunan Bay near Montrose while they were on their monthly outing.

The swallow appeared to be well off course as it is usually found in the southern Mediterranean before migrating to its wintering ground in Africa.

As they were watching the swallow, which had perched on the roof of a local farm building, they saw a sparrowhawk swoop down and fly away with it.

“We were horrified,” said Mike Sawyer of the Dundee RSPB. “We had just phoned local birdwatchers to tell them of this rare occurrence and then had to ring them back to tell them it had been eaten.”

The red-rumped swallow was last spotted in Tayside in 1987 in Broughty Ferry and has only been seen about a dozen times before in mainland Scotland.

It was the second death of a rare bird in Tayside in as many weeks. Eileen Alexander, of Kemnay Gardens, Dundee, saw an Australian black-throated finch collapse and die in her back garden as she was feeding the birds last month. It is almost certain it was an escaped caged bird.

One of Australia’s most vulnerable bird species, the southern black-throated finch was re-classified from “vulnerable” to “endangered” by the government last year.

“Last month I was out in the garden feeding the birds when I noticed two sparrows watching this tiny bird that was hobbling around,” said Eileen. “Then the poor wee thing took a nosedive into the mud.

“I went to take a look at it but it was dead, so I picked it up and called a friend of mine at the McManus Galleries to see if he could identify it.

“He took one look at it and said he’d never seen anything like it in his life, so he took it away for investigation and found it was an Australian black-throated finch. It doesn’t live or migrate to this country so it probably came from a house or pet shop.”

Mike Nicoll, taxidermist at the McManus Galleries, said, “I have the bird in the freezer just now, and I may get round to preserving it in the future. While this specimen is interesting it’s not really our thing, to be honest. We focus on local wildlife and this is a foreign visitor, probably released from a domestic cage.”

An RSPB spokesman said the red- rumped swallow is typically found in the southern Mediterranean and migrates in winter to tropical Africa.

“It’s a rare visitor to the UK, but does occasionally turn up during the migratory seasons, probably after losing its way,” he said. “Any confirmed sighting of an Australian black-throated finch would almost certainly be an escaped caged bird.

“Birds in captivity are often used to a rich diet and usually struggle to survive in the wild. In principle it’s not good in either welfare or ecological terms to release alien captive birds and we can only hope that this wasn't done intentionally.”