The Red-backed Shrike, the youngster on the fence
A fierce songbird with raptor instincts, this juvenile Red-backed Shrike monitors open country from barbed wire perches before migrating to Africa.
My field observations in the Var — sites, months and context
✓ Aug 2026 Synthesis (2 records)Juvenile photographed in late summer 2026, perched on barbed wire across the open Var plain against soft creamy bokeh.
Commented in situ photo gallery
1 telephoto photographs taken in the Var department (Rule 11)
Recognizing the species on my photos — visible details
Length 17 cm. The juvenile's plumage — warm scaled grey-brown with speckled pale underparts — contrasts with the adult male. Hooked bill built to impale and dismember insects.
Spiny scrub, open farmland, hedgerows, fallow fields and traditional vineyards.
Grasshoppers, beetles, wall lizards and small passerines impaled on thorns or wire barbs.
Photographing the species: field experience
Faithful to its lookouts on wire fences, offering an ideal stance to emphasize creamy shallow depth of field.
- •Impales prey onto thorns or barbed wire barbs, creating characteristic 'larders'.
- •Subject of Cyril Garnier's 1st Prize winning photograph at the 2026 Changis-sur-Marne Nature Contest.
- •The first-year juvenile's scaly brown plumage is strikingly distinct from the adult male's plumage.
