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14/11/2024

Wild bird species continue to decline - “Wild? I was absolutely livid!”

Yellowhammer - SP White

By Henrietta Appleton, GWCT Policy Officer (England)

Wild bird populations continue to decline as demonstrated by Government statistics released on 12th November. We have used the graphs for breeding farmland, woodland, water and wetland and upland birds generated by these statistics many times to emphasise the need for a change in approach to conservation.

In a speech at a House of Lords reception to celebrate 75 years of National Parks, Natural England (NE) Chairman Tony Juniper also recognised that we need to move from nature conservation to nature recovery. Marian Spain, NE CEO, reinforced this by emphasising the need to do things differently.

So why the ‘Not the Nine O’clock News’ quote above?

As members will know the GWCT has been emphasising the importance of learning from the research-based evidence we as an organisation have collated over the last 90 years.

This work has emphasised that effective species recovery is based on 3 principles, namely: habitat provision, food (including supplementary feeding) and, for species which show population levels of decline due to poor survival rates of their young, protection from predation pressure.

Each site and species are unique and therefore the relative proportions of these elements will change – as they will by season. These three principles have been shown to be effective conservation measures for a range of upland, lowland and woodland fauna.

Currently the Environmental Land Management scheme (ELMS) focusses on habitat provision; evidence from our species recovery projects is that this is not enough to encourage population growth.

We have been promoting this recipe for species recovery to policymakers for over a decade, only to see the “business as usual” approach of habitat alone continuing as adopting the GWCT model requires some difficult decisions; or perhaps even more concerningly, and without adequate evidence, the concept of “Rewilding” offered up as the ultimate solution.

Species management is justified where it is proven, through rigorous scientific research, to support desired outcomes (the prevention of localised extinctions, for example) and where its adoption does not impact on the sustainability of the predator population.

It must also be monitored and proportionate and undertaken by trained ‘professionals’ using tools tested against international humane trapping and welfare standards.

I am therefore “absolutely livid” that against the background of the continuing decline in our wild birds, evidenced measures available to reverse that decline are not being adopted. Time is running out.

Topic: Policy , Farming

Comments

Insects

at 22:22 on 30/11/2024 by Nick vZ

One of the major pressures on bird populations is the huge (80%?) decline in insect numbers. While the popular pundits concentrate on predators (both avian and mammalian) and protect those predators there is little hope for their prey. The natural world does not understand Human politics. Whether these folk will see and understand their folly when the last bird of prey eats the other "last bird of prey" I've no idea. But on present form they will be still blaming everyone else BUT themselves. Class warfare has no place in this discussion but ......

HOUSE BUILDING - HABITAT DESTRUCTION

at 18:06 on 28/11/2024 by sylvia

Those four words: HOUSE-BUILDING = HABITAT DESTRUCTION says it all. Countryside has to be connected, yet the government and their friends in high development places want to connect urban developments. Local councils like mine, vote to state there is a 'climate emergency' and then vote to destroy rare turtle dove habitats for their developer friends who are going to construct luxury spa hotels and surfing lagoons.

small bird scarcity on farm

at 17:05 on 28/11/2024 by Anthony Oliver

very noticeable that our stopping keeping livestock (sheep & cattle) most of the various wild birds have now 'disappeared' - particularly around feed points in the fields, The bat population is now also nearly non-existent! Why? - answer - NO INSECTS - or certainly nothing like their used to be when animals grazed here. Nothing else in the area has changed - hedges intact and ponds still there etc. Increase in Buzzards and Corvids but it is the lack of insects that is the main problem'

Wild bird decline / Predator Control

at 11:53 on 28/11/2024 by Malcolm Mellor

I am now eighty years of age, and a lifelong countryman. I remember the days when each dawn chorus was an assault on the senses, a veritable’ ‘Alleluia’ !! A walk up any hedgerow provided an impressive list of resident species, with an appropriate population of migrants in their various seasons. Today - virtual silence !!!! In my humble opinion, and as farming practices have progressed, the two main reasons for bird loss are habitat destruction and predation. The first is clear to see - hedges gone, ditches and ponds filled in, huge fields, monoculture, sprays and chemicles in abundance etc etc In conjunction with that scenario, what remains of the local bird population is being devastated by pests and apex avian predators . At one time here on the farm in North Norfolk, a Buzzard, Red Kite or Marsh Harrier was a tolerable rarity. Today virtually an everyday sight- with two species regularly nesting. There is simply no way that our farmland birds can stand such pressure of predation. At one time we boasted twenty plus pairs of English Partridge on a little over seven hundred acres. This year, and despite using all methods of legal pest control for corvids and ground predators - three breeding pairs hatched and fledged ten chicks. They were ‘hammered’ by Kites, who having located the broods, just kept constant surveillance. Note - English Partridge are a RSPB Red Listed species - I wonder why. So conservationists, create as much ‘wilding habitat’ as you like, but without intervention to then control ‘all’ predators common sense should tell you, that you are simply going to aid the continual decline and eventual loss of our iconic farmland birds. How very sad. At least I know my eighty years have taught me something- and truly hope the next generation will listen.

Wild

at 17:43 on 20/11/2024 by John Dickson

The rewinding process at Knepp is showing what can be done if the will exists. Birds such as turtle doves returning is a big achievement.

Apex number control

at 10:45 on 20/11/2024 by Willie

I agree with most comments but one question that needs to be answered by the people who make our laws on protecting apex predators is at what point and what numbers do they deem a problem to the declineing numbers of our ground nesting birds answering my own question simply never as it doesn’t win votes

Wild Bird Species decline

at 8:15 on 20/11/2024 by James Dowling

Supplementary feeding of birds to help decline is obviously beneficial but supplementary feeding of raptors just for public entertainment upsets the natural balance.

Wild….I’m absolutely

at 7:28 on 20/11/2024 by Ted Williams

Several excellent responses. Us and them again. Points well made. “Our”Dick Potts was right . “They” know he was. Urban dwellers-, largely informed of country issues through the “death averse” media, and the policies of back slapping partners in crime, NE, RSPB, RSPCA, County Wildlife Trusts etc,- expect the brown rat population to be controlled by councils, and let the cat out, to do whatever its predatory instincts decide. Perhaps the numbers should be published to show the hypocrisy of those who oppose lethal predator control out in the country? The Farmer Cluster success is surely a significant opportunity to promote not only habitat enhancement of landscape scale, but to describe the crucial benefits of the Third Leg of the stool, for identifiable species recovery. We have examples already, thanks to a number of large-and small- sporting estates, Peppering the exemplar.

Decline in birds

at 23:28 on 19/11/2024 by john lance

To many magpies rooks ect. Change the law on shooting / culing said predators , on a 150 acre farm we used to have hundreds of small birds ,now I hardly see any , even with feeders nothing about ,country side is lost with now with ignorance ruling what we can do and not do ..

Wild

at 16:52 on 19/11/2024 by David R Holmes

As long as people like Juniper are in positions of power with regard to wildlife policy, there will be no success. The three legged stool principle is absolutely correct, but impossible to implement with hunt sabs, “Wild Justice “ and their media followers thwarting any logical approach. All wildlife protection orders must be reviewed on a regular time scale, and altered/cancelled when a balance has been lost. Mention corvids, gulls, badgers, foxes,etc, all of which require status review. By the same token, the result of apex predator release (martens),whilst expecting in the same breath to be rejuvenating ground nesting bird numbers, is potty. Carry on the good work gwct, hopefully right will prevail.

Wild

at 16:52 on 19/11/2024 by David R Holmes

As long as people like Juniper are in positions of power with regard to wildlife policy, there will be no success. The three legged stool principle is absolutely correct, but impossible to implement with hunt sabs, “Wild Justice “ and their media followers thwarting any logical approach. All wildlife protection orders must be reviewed on a regular time scale, and altered/cancelled when a balance has been lost. Mention corvids, gulls, badgers, foxes,etc, all of which require status review. By the same token, the result of apex predator release (martens),whilst expecting in the same breath to be rejuvenating ground nesting bird numbers, is potty. Carry on the good work gwct, hopefully right will prevail.

Decline of our bird population garden&field

at 16:42 on 19/11/2024 by Stuart Gullen

Something definitely needs doing now but for people like myself I try my best putting up feeders etc flora for insects but what else can I do my voice falls on deaf ears

Decline of our bird population garden&field

at 16:42 on 19/11/2024 by Stuart Gullen

Something definitely needs doing now but for people like myself I try my best putting up feeders etc flora for insects but what else can I do my voice falls on deaf ears

Captive breeding

at 16:19 on 19/11/2024 by Falco Scot

Being one of the pioneers of captive breeding raptors I went to Natural England after retiring with a project to create a captive bred population of native peregrines as most of captive birds we have in the UK are not native sub-species. The project would have produced native birds for falconry and for release if the need ever arose, in line with the IUCN's policy on captive breeding. We were granted 3 licenses which we weren't able to action because of covid movement restriction. I have since gone back for more licenses, the licensing manager I worked with previously had left and I received nothing but hostility from that point on, hence no more licenses. Further challenges resulted in a communications ban which has now lasted over 3 years, which has degraded me to a 2nd class citizen. The IUCN's policy is that captive breeding should commence when a species population is heathy so if there was a sudden decline we have specimens in the bank, so to say. The horizon scanning ability of both Natural England and NatureScot is ZERO but they seem to thrive on failure. This incompetence goes right to the top with both the Ms Spain and Mr Juniper to blame given the unaccountability of their staff There is no back up plan with these people, and they're never likely to have one if they keep locking people out who have lived and breathed our eco-systems all their lives. I can only imagine they both grew up on Walt Disney films and have no understand whatsoever of the reality of wildlife conservation..

Garden Birds

at 16:14 on 19/11/2024 by Richard Banks

My garden used to be full of blackbirds, finches, thrushes and tits etc. Now it is full of magpies, pigeons and sparrowhawks. The river was full of fish and now it's empty apart from pike. The otters and cormorants are protected and devour all our fish. No hedgehogs anymore only skins, all killed by badgers - protected to the point of being over populated. Bring back gamekeepers to get us back into balance.

Predator Controlo

at 15:29 on 19/11/2024 by Alistair William Jackson Kerr

Totally agree with Michael Hurdle (above). Species here (East Yorkshire) that are out of control include magpies and carrion crows. Amazingly, some songbirds survive (Tree Sparrows, Yellowhammers, Reed Buntings, Goldfinches....) but not as many as would have been seen and heard in the 1970s. We have some ground-nesting brds, but foxes are too numerous here and have a fan club in the form of hunt saboteurs, who probably feed them in winter! Too many Grey Squirrels, and someone or other has released a couple of Pine Martens.

Decline of songbirds

at 15:04 on 19/11/2024 by john kitchener

Lots of comments above but none mention domestic cats. They kill millions of songbirds and chicks each year. Also, we should be encouraged to control magpies and squirrels but they are seen as "pretty little things" so are above reproach, as is "pussy". The other corvids, rooks, crows and jackdaws have also multiplied out of all proportion and do huge damage. "Three and twenty blackbirds" was a good thing but in todays snowflake world, shooting young birds off the nest would be an excuse to call the police!

Predators

at 14:57 on 19/11/2024 by Neville Passmore

Trouble is to many squeamish people, predators need to be culled all the year round, because they eat every day of the year, not in seasons,mink are decimating all wild life, let go by people that knew better 😜, need to crack down hard now

Bird decline

at 14:57 on 19/11/2024 by Richard phillips

I have 25acres and encourage brambles and hedges unfortunately the jay, magpie and crow are doing a good job of clearing may of the small birds not all the gold finch seems to have outsmarted the predators including wren and goldcrest. Had a stone chat in field for 2/3 weeks but crow watched it feed and go to nest so that stopped them returning to the nest, they were there after but no young.

The base of the food chain

at 14:43 on 19/11/2024 by Oldcountrywoman

I've lived here for 40+ years - surrounded by monoculture. Mass extinction of bird and more visible animals has accelerated - except for those that can thrive like deer and corvids ( with the exception of rooks which have gone along with the crane flies they are designed to feed on ). IMHO it because there are little or none of the bug life that used to be common - earwigs, woodlice, slugs, snails the list is too long for here. Stick a spade in the wheat or rape fields around and there are almost no worms - so no moles - the farmers friend is the sprayer now. Even the ' game keeper' bemoaning the loss of grey partridge said that the chicks could eat caterpillars.... I pointed out that the chicks are ground feeders ... I despair and wish crop rotation and gamekeepers gibbets would reappear. The run off from the fields has even removed what little existed in my garden. At least field sports kept coverts, and habitat for the quarry allowing some respite for everything else. All gone now, even the fox to the cities, along with the use of glycophosphates and insecticides, and more. Maybe we can teach those grey partridge chicks to climb plants to feast on the caterpillars and maybe the farm manager will know what a yellowhammer is.... Not

WILD BIRD PREDATION

at 11:58 on 19/11/2024 by STEVEN BEALE

I read the excellent comments from people who know what it is all about. Interestingly the "sacred" badger is conveniently hardly mentioned in most past and present writing. Contravertial culls have been organised to assist to reduce bovine TB and the figures say succesfull, so why do we not see pressure to extend this scheme to include endangered wildlife. I have watched one to multiple badgers "worming" fields and hedgerows and miss nothing on the ground or in reach. Pressure should be given to the "governing wildlife experts"( to many to mention) to allow culling by shooting only (no dogs) by authorised personel. As,prior to the outright ban on control,the badger will never be extinct but endangered species may be given a chance with some reduction.

Decline of bird population

at 11:53 on 19/11/2024 by Susan Byford

I agree that we need to control the predators, sparrowhawks area big problem here and not the slightest bit shy, but we also need to restore habitat, as in reinstate the hedgerows where possible.

More predation

at 10:48 on 19/11/2024 by Gareth Chetwynd

Anyone who has the eyes of a country(wo)man and who has a few decades under their boots can see so much that is wrong. We used to routinely shoot out grey squirrel dreys and magpies nests to disrupt their breeding and that was just part of a stewardship culture and nothing to do with posh folk and their country estates. There is an uninformed metropolitan squeamishness about controlling predation. It needs much more attention as the source of imbalance. There is enough carrion on our roads these days to support superpopulation of magpies and kites. And compare the environmental footprint of eating wood pigeons to beef, or the supremely unnatural salmon farming….. I could go on…

Insects

at 17:15 on 18/11/2024 by Nick vZ

What everyone seems to have missed in the comments is the huge decline in insect numbers. My present estimate is about 80% down from the late 1970's but it maty be more or less. Without insects and the bottom of the food chains all will fail ere long. You can't have top end predators with out masse of surplus prey. Its the 3 legged stool stupid!!

Species Population Control

at 9:06 on 18/11/2024 by Martyn Jackson

Population management and control should be driven by science - not by emotion. If an area of land was overgrown with brambles nobody would think twice about removing some of the brambles to allow other species to flourish - substitute foxes, magpies, carrion crows, rats etc for brambles and the same principle applies. There also seems to be an increasing trend to spend large amounts of money and effort on releasing and encouraging species which were present in the UK in the past, rather than looking after our existing flora and fauna. For example, Sea eagles which have been released in Scotland, are causing massive, unsustainable problems to sheep farmers, they are also affecting golden eagles through competition for nest sites and territories and have driven the naturalised feral goat population to the brink of extinction as they predating all the kids.

Wild bird species decline

at 8:56 on 18/11/2024 by Robert Findlay

Until organisations like the GWCT get the coverage they deserve on popular countryside TV programmes to prove their evidence based approach really works things will follow the agenda that popular TV nature presenters with their own agenda want the public to believe and are given the air time to push this ideology. It is vitally important for the publics perception of fieldsports that sustainable shooting policies that our organisations recommend are followed, this all helps with future discussions to prove we can self regulate without the need for more regulation

Raptor Control

at 21:18 on 15/11/2024 by G Pope

Three times now, I’ve seen a sparrowhawk decimate, our nesting swallows and chicks, watch from a telegraph line and target the nest of a long, tailed, tit and I’ve seen a sparrow hawk target goldfinches. Red kites have even been targeting curlew chicks, and terns on the coast. Too many raptors. Too many apex predators. We need to manage the population, just like we manage so much of wildlife to ensure there is balance.

The decline of wild birds close to our home.

at 11:34 on 15/11/2024 by Shadwell

It’s all gone quiet over there? No, it’s all gone quiet everywhere! Along our stretch of the Bridgewater and the Trent and Mersey canals, we have two nature corridors that should be alive with birdlife but the canals and the trees are silent. The robin and wren seem to hold their own and as spring arrives chiffchaffs are there in numbers and break the silence. To see much else you must stand and wait and wait. No bullfinch, chaffinch or greenfinch, one yellowhammer in two years, no siskins or twites for three years but, in our garden on the feeders, plenty of goldfinch. The garden has modest habitat where house sparrows roam in gangs using the hawthorn hedges for cover; swallows nest in six stables/barn areas and often have three clutches; jackdaws still claim two chimney pots; grey and pied wagtails work the pond margins and a kingfisher has found a suitable fishing perch. Starlings decimate our feeders and two bad-tempered nuthatches do their upside down tricks. The dunnock is sadly missed along with our thrushes and much else. The key to it all has to be safe habitat with everybody making their contribution, no matter how limited this may be and a much greater awareness of the consequences if this doesn’t happen !

Species Population Control

at 10:29 on 15/11/2024 by Martyn Jackson

Population management and control should be driven by science - not by emotion. If an area of land was overgrown with brambles nobody would think twice about removing some of the brambles to allow other species to flourish - substitute foxes, magpies, carrion crows, rats etc for brambles and the same principle applies. There also seems to be an increasing trend to spend large amounts of money and effort on releasing and encouraging species which were present in the UK in the past, rather than looking after our existing flora and fauna. For example, Sea eagles which have been released in Scotland, are causing massive, unsustainable problems to sheep farmers, they are also affecting golden eagles through competition for nest sites and territories and have driven the naturalised feral goat population to the brink of extinction as they predating all the kids.

Wild

at 10:11 on 15/11/2024 by Ian Coghill

Entirely right. The mark of an idiot is repeatedly doing what doesn't work, in the hope that it will. The mark of a charlatan is refusing to do what you know will work, whilst trousering millions for doing what you know will not.

Predator control

at 8:32 on 15/11/2024 by George Winn-Darley

And so we should all be livid! Good and timely points made Henrietta. The EFGs should surely lead the way by implementing trained predator controllers on areas where it is not already practiced. There would be marriage value by joining it up as well as of course by turbo charging the delivery of biodiversity on the back of the habitat changes which have been implemented, and no doubt more will be introduced as -part of the EFG works. Focussed on removing INNS such as mink, grey squirrel is an easy sell but year round or targeted fox control, targeted corvid control in spring, and mustelid control all would boost biodiversity. Perhaps even organising deer control where needed. A full time position to cover a large area (10,000 acres? ) could easily be viable perhaps mixed with some time spent monitoring the species that will benefit to show the results. Co-ordinating volunteers in this monitoring and perhaps even in some of the control works such as mink raft monitoring would be a useful adjunct.

Predation

at 8:10 on 15/11/2024 by Michael Hurdle

Time to get more aggressive and start chucking boulders into the pond to stress the sheer necessity of predation control if we are to stop and hopefully reverse the decline in our some of our wild bird species . Men need to accept the reality that they are at the apex of predators and they need to accept the responsibility that this brings

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