Black Bird Terrorizes British Family by Imitating Ambulance Sirens

"I've been out throwing little stones at it hoping it'll fly away, but it never does....It's only a tiny bird but the sound is so loud, there is no drowning it out."

Маленький черный дрозд в течение трех месяцев терроризирует британскую семью, подражая сирене «скорой помощи». Пока семейство изнывает от бессонницы, британские оринтологи восхищаются: такую птицу последний раз наблюдали 20 лет назад. (Novaya gazeta/The Mirror)

The Mirror (7-11-08) reported on Friday:

Is that another ambulance I can hear dear? No it's a bleeding blackbird copying the siren...AGAIN.

Sounds odd, but sadly true for Nathan Talbot, 39, his wife Alison and two children who are woken at five every morning by a fledgling mimicking the noise of emergency vehicles.

And it's driving the family, who live near a hospital, potty.

Nathan said: "He will continue on and off until around 8pm.

"When I first heard the sound, it was funny but now it's just annoying. It keeps us and all our neighbours awake.

"I've been out throwing little stones at it hoping it'll fly away, but it never does."

..."It's only a tiny bird but the sound is so loud, there is no drowning it out."

The bird sits on the roof of the Talbot home at Westonsuper-Mare, Somerset, or in a nearby tree doing its impressions which include Nathan's mobile and car alarms. It also wolf whistles.