Photo by Marco Hebig
What is a "calling bird"
In the song 12 Days of Christmas, it is widely accepted the gift on the fourth day is "four colly birds", not "four calling birds". The word colly means 'black as coal'. Therefore, the gift on the fourth day of Christmas was the Common Blackbird (Turdus merula), common throughout the UK. The fourth day of Christmas, by the way, is December 28.
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BarrytheBirder
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