Configure mailto: links in Emacs to bring up Windows' default e-mail client (i. e. Thunderbird)

Mailto: links open a new mail composition buffer internally with my current config. Spent some time searching the web for how to make the link open in Thunderbird (just as URLs are launched in the default browser). I tried >(setq browse-url-mailto-function 'browse-url-generic) > >(setq browse-url-generic-program "open") but that didn't work (Linux only?) - getting error message >Searching for program: No such file or directory, open Any help would be much appreciated, thanks.

Figured it out. Had to set browse-url-mail to nil.

Thanks so much for putting the solution here.