This article first appeared in ‘British Birds’ volume 50:8 (pages 348–9), in August 1957.
Bird and place names were spelt as shown. For their current status, please see our county lists.
Black Stork in Worcestershire. — On 31st May 1956, I was passing through the Wyre Forest, Worcestershire, in mid-afternoon, accompanied by a party of boys from Bushbury Hill Secondary School, when a Black Stork (Ciconia nigra) was flushed from Dowles Brook. From our position of about 30 feet above the brook, black plumage, long red bill and legs, and slow heron-like wing-beats were noted immediately; and as the bird rose higher the white belly was also clearly observed. Once it was above the level of the trees, the bird turned and came gliding back over our heads — this gave us an excellent opportunity to see that the lower breast, as well as the belly and under tail-coverts, was white. The bird then circled round and disappeared. This is the first record of the Black Stork in Worcestershire.
R. J. Bradney
[As we go to press, Mr. E. M. Rutter, Editor of The Birds of Shropshire, tells us that Miss. E. J. Peele and Miss P. Barlee saw a stork in Shropshire on 30th May 1956, the day before the Worcestershire record. This bird was watched for about two minutes flying at a height of about 60 feet at Haughmond Hill, 3 miles east of Shrewsbury, and after circling it flew off in the direction of Wrekin, a line which would bring it approximately to the Wrye Forest. The characteristic shape was well seen, but in poor light the species was not determined. — Eds.]
Reproduced by kind permission of British Birds 
.
Ornithology in Staffordshire, Warwickshire, Worcestershire & the West Midlands county, since 1929.
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