Whistling mystery

On Wednesday morning, while I was sorting out moths, I heard a weird whistling sound. I'm usually not too bad at identifying bird sounds, so it was a little puzzling that I couldn't even decide which family of birds it might be from. It was really distracting, but in the end I ignored it and got on with the moths.

This morning I was also out in the garden early to go through the night's moths, and the phantom whistler was heard again. Fortunately I had expert (moth and bird) help with me this time, and a search party was sent out to locate the source of the whistles.

Half a mile down the road, this bird was found sitting in an ash tree. We think it's a Northern Bobwhite (quail), an American species. The 'song' was really loud amd piercing.

Obviously it shouldn't be roaming the countryside, but did it escape its aviary or did someone let it out? If it was in my garden I'd find it a bit annoying!