Nightingales colonising new habitats in Orlestone

Tonight, I called in on two areas of woodland that are part of Orlestone Forest. Both areas have been felled of conifers in recent years to leave what is today a scrub of Blackthorn, Sallows and Birch to a height of 2-4 metres. The first area, Sir Edward Street's Wood, had just one singing Nightingale present tonight.

The second area of scrub, just a mile away, was my last stop of the night, and this is the northern end of Birchett Wood (footpath to east of grid ref 982363). This area showed promise with one bird singing here for the last 2 years, so I was keen to see if the Nightingales would be back. However, I was delighted to find the scrub alive with Nightingale song. There are two areas of scrub here are divided by firebreaks, and a rough estimate would be 6 - 10 Nightingales singing. The Nightingales here have found the new scrub exactly to their liking. As for the similar habitat in Sir Edward Street's wood being near empty, well, perhaps birds of a feather really do stick together, or perhaps the scrub height is, in detail, not as tall and the tree density not so dense?

5 year old scrub (?) at Birchett wood northern end May 2nd 2012- Nightingales love it!