Summer visitors to the UK, the churring call of the male nightjar is an iconic sound of warm heathland evenings.
Photo: © Natural England/Allan Drewitt

Nightjars are the champions of stealth. They are nocturnal, with mottled brown feathers that melt into the dim light of dawn and dusk as they hunt on silent wings for their insect food. Their colouration is cryptic by day, too. A ground-breeding species, the female (and occasionally the male) sits on her nest among the undergrowth, still and quiet, blending into the surroundings. 

It is, however, not possible to miss the churring rise and fall of the male’s call. An iconic sound of heathland evenings in the summer, the long trill (the male can keep the call going for up to ten minutes at a time) sometimes ends with wing-clapping (you can hear this on the xeno.canto audio file indicated above), the sound of which is produced by a whiplash effect, rather than the wings actually clapping together.

Nightjars are summer visitors to the UK. The males get here first in order to establish territories, which they defend vigorously against competitors. Display flights – spiralling on V-shaped wings with fanned tails – mark the arrival of the females. One or two eggs are laid directly onto the ground among roots or plants, with no nest, and are mainly incubated by the female for a period of about 18 days. The pair sometimes produce a second brood.