 Albion 's main club badge dates back to the late 1880s , when the club 's secretary Tom Smith suggested that a throstle ( song thrush ) sitting on a crossbar be adopted for the badge . Since then , the club badge has always featured a throstle , usually on a blue and white striped shield , although the crossbar was replaced with a hawthorn branch at some point after the club 's move to the Hawthorns . The throstle was chosen because the public house in which the team used to change kept a pet thrush in a cage . It also gave rise to Albion 's early nickname , the Throstles . As late as the 1930s , a caged throstle was placed beside the touchline during matches and it was said that it only used to sing if Albion were winning . In 1979 an effigy of a throstle was erected above the half @-@ time scoreboard of the Woodman corner at the Hawthorns , and was returned to the same area of the ground following redevelopment in the early 2000s . 
