Plot Summary:When bird-watcher Ralph Ford claims to have seen a blue-crested hoopoe - thus winning him the year's list contest - other members of the Midsomer-in-the-Marsh ornithological society are angry, especially society chairman Patrick Morgan, who, later that night is lured to his death by a call on Ford's stolen phone. Morgan was generally unpopular in the society and farmer George Napier benefits by the death as Morgan intended to save wetlands he intended to drain whilst his Russian widow Nina, a former ballerina, is pregnant, and since her husband had had a vasectomy he is not the father. The real father is the next victim - will a third person meet their death at the hands of one who has killed two people as well as a rare bird?
A row between keen birdwatchers in Midsomer-in-the-Marsh turns nasty when their president is killed. Patrick Morgan met his death while hoping to sight a rare bird, but is his obsession with ornithology to blame - or something more sinister?