Did you know the Song thrush was once known as the Throstle?

It appeared as such in Thomas Berwick’s landmark birding guide book Land Birds back in 1797, the name was later standardised to Song thrush – makes sense when you listen to the great tunes it belts out – but, as recently as 1951, when he published his Collins New Naturalist volume Birds and Men, Max Nicholson was still arguing for the name to change back to Throstle. Song thrush or Throstle – which do you prefer?

Regurgitating interesting titbits from Stephen Moss’s delectable Mrs Moreau’s Warbler: How birds got their names, Guardian Faber, London, 2018.