Strange bird song

[windflower]

This morning I heard a strange bird song in my local Herefordshire wood, in a dense and rather wet area of ash, alder and hazel. It was a long, drawn out and rather soft rattling sound, almost like a cicada. It was repeated many times at intervals but oddly I couldn't tell whether it was coming from the ground or up in the trees. Can anyone suggest what bird this might have been?

[Dogghound]

Sounds like it could have been a tit (likely blue or great) alarm call.

[shaun a]

I would agree with dog more likely to be an alarm call from a tit

[animartco]

Hello Windflower. You say the sound was soft. And repeated. Was it repeated at regular intervals? If it was it was more likely to be a song than an alarm. Nor are alarms ever soft. Did the pitch vary throughout the churring? It sounds like you could have clocked in the first grasshopper warbler of the season!

[Sprout]

maybe a greenfinch? they make a very odd sound when they're not actually singing, very much as windflower describes. i had to google up one of the bird-sound sites to identify it.

[Lance Morgan]

Woodcock?

[windflower]

It definitely wasn't a tit. I'm familiar with tit calls and songs. This happened on the same walk I have done every day for 20 years and I've never heard it before. Not a greenfinch or a woodcock either. It's certainly nearest to a grasshopper warbler, or rather the lower pitch of a Savi's, but the sounds were only about three seconds in duration, repeated at intervals of anything up to a minute or more. Also they were softer and less tinny as if produced by a rather bigger bird.

[valleyforge]

Your initial description windflower, brought to my mind the alert call of a siskin, perhaps?

I may have to reconsider that based on your last update, which coincided with my response.

[Gill Catton]

sounds like a wren alarm call to me.

[RoyW]

This might seem like a slightly odd suggestion, but I suspect that your mystery bird was probably a Carrion Crow.

They occasionally give a soft rattling call that most people are unfamiliar with. I've tried a brief online search but haven't been able to find a recording - if I have time later I'll try again.