The decline of British starlings

26/07/19

It's winter and the sun is setting over the waving reeds in front you. A few small, black dots begin to fly in: Common Starlings. They're joined by more and more coming from left, right and centre, until thousands of starlings come together as one, and suddenly you're watching a breathtaking murmuration. With so many thousands of birds dancing through the winter sky above you, it's easy to be fooled into thinking the species is doing rather well. Sadly, this couldn't be further from the truth.

The stark facts are that between 1995 and 2016, Britain's breeding population of Common Starling crashed by a staggering 51 per cent. Just let that sink in. It means that there are now only half as many starlings in Britain than when I started watching birds with my dad during the mid-1990s. The situation in England is even worse: we saw an 87 per cent decline between 1967 and 2015. Starlings no longer nest in large parts of Wales and southern England.

Back to that murmuration – many of the starlings you're watching above your head will have travelled here to escape the winter freeze in countries to the north and east. In those places too, numbers are falling, and we're seeing fewer of these birds arriving each year. It means that the large winter gatherings we're used to seeing are becoming smaller. Are the days of starling murmurations numbered?

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RSPB boss: Britain has one last chance to save endangered species

Chief executive warns of a devastating loss of wildlife if three new parliamentary bills do not rein in UK farming practices

Ministers may have only 12 months to rescue Britain’s degraded environment and to save its endangered birds and animals. That is the stark conclusion of Michael Clarke, chief executive of the RSPB, who has warned that parliamentary bills – to be published over the next year – will have to make crucial changes to the way our farms and fisheries are run if the wildlife and landscape of the nation are to be rescued from their dangerously depleted condition.

“We are on a cusp, and if we fail to act decisively we will pay the price in coming years,” Clarke told the Observer last week.

The three forthcoming bills – on agriculture, on fisheries and on the environment – will replace the EU legislation that currently controls our farming, fishing industry and the quality of our air, water and wildlife. The government has yet to announce what these bills will contain. However, conservationists such as Clarke now fear there is a real risk that one or all of these new pieces of legislation will fail to provide the necessary powers to restore our crisis-hit environment.

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Alderney becomes Britain's 20th Bird Observatory

Britain’s birds are amongst the best monitored animals in the world, and it just about to get even better as a brand new bird observatory joins the nineteen others that are scattered around our coast.

Alderney Bird Observatory becomes the most southerly bird observatory in Britain

Alderney Bird Observatory (ABO) received official accreditation at a recent meeting of the Bird Observatories Council (BOC), a gathering of all of the bird observatories, making it the twentieth in the country. Ranging from Fair Isle, Shetland, in the north to Alderney, Channel Islands, in the south, Britain’s bird observatories have kept an eye on the comings and goings of our birds since the first observatory Skokholm, Wales, opened in 1933 – these unbroken observations make them amongst the largest datasets in the world.

Many firsts for Britain have been found and documented at Bird Observatories but it is the day-to day observations of birds on the move that are the most important, birds making their way in and out of Britain on their migrations from far-flung destinations. Since the 1960s several of these have changed the timing of their migration as a response to a changing climate. The Swallow now arrives back in the UK on average fifteen days earlier than it did in the 60s, and the Sand Martin over twenty days earlier, whilst for the Cuckoo the timing hasn’t really changed. It is vital that we keep an eye out for changing patterns in the future if we are to fully understand the pressures that many of our birds might face and how we might help those that are showing declines.

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50 disused quarries turned into wildlife habitats to help Britain's endangered birds

 Sarah Knapton, science editor 

27 JANUARY 2018 • 5:05PM

A conservation project to turn 50 quarries into nature reserves by 2020 has been completed two years early and is already saving endangered species, like the turtle dove.

In 2010, the RSPB joined forces with building materials supplier CEMEX to rejuvenate dozens of disused quarries.

And within fewer than eight years, 1,000 hectares of grassland, woodland, heath and wetland has been created which is helping rare and unusual species to flourish including 50 ‘at risk’ species.

Threatened birds which have moved into the conservation areas include turtle doves, choughs and twites, all of which have seen huge falls in numbers in the past decades.

Martin Harper, the RSPB’s director of conservation said: “Nature is in trouble but by restoring or creating habitats we can often reverse the population declines of threatened species while keeping common species common. We all have a role to play in rising to this challenge: government, business and civil society.

“In 2010 the RSPB and CEMEX set an ambitious goal of restoring 1,000 hectares of land over a decade and in less than eight years we have met that target.

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Hawfinch invasion as rare birds flock to Britain in thousands after crop failures in Europe

Sarah Knapton, science editor 

1 DECEMBER 2017 • 12:01AM

Flocks of rare hawfinches have begun arriving in Britain in huge numbers following crop failures in Germany and Romania.

The little birds largely bypass the UK in the winter, staying in central Europe, but poor harvests on the continent has sent them further north looking for autumn fruits and nuts.

Nature experts are urging people to get outside this weekend to glimpse the elusive birds that are renowned for their parrot like bills, and which are flocking in groups of 100 or more, which is around 12 times the national average.

The National Trust has reported there hawfinches at Fyne Court, Somerset - where hawfinches have not been seen for seven years - as well Clumber Park, Nottinghamshire, Sizergh, in Cumbria and the Slindon Estate in West Sussex.

The birds have also been spotted at Sissinghurst in Kent, Felbrigg in Norfolk, Hatfield Forest in Essex, Basildon Park in Berks, Steps Hill at Ashridge in Bucks and Wimpole in Cambs.

Nature specialist Matthew Oates, says, “There has been an unprecedented influx of these shy and secretive birds to our shores.

“The keenest of birders may only spot a handful of hawfinches during years of birdwatching but right now, everyone has a chance.

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Britain's smallest bird finds sanctuary in gardens

15/10/2017

The British Trust for Ornithology’s (BTO) Garden Bird Feeding Survey (GBFS) has revealed that a cold spell in late winter 2016-17 caused an influx of birds to feeders, including Goldcrests in particular.  

Winter 2016-17 was generally mild and garden feeders consequently quiet, but results from the GBFS found that more birds were making use of the supplementary food we put out during a cold snap in late January and early February. 

One of the species coming to British feeders in the colder weather was Goldcrest. In fact, Garden BirdWatchers have recorded high numbers of the species in gardens over the last two winters, with counts in February 2017 being 35 per cent higher than the average for the previous five years.

So far this year, it looks promising for another Goldcrest garden invasion, with high preliminary counts for September. Numbers of the species are severely affected by low winter temperatures, but the predominately mild winter weather of recent years might have helped to boost numbers.

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British obsession with feeding birds is making their beaks grow longer, scientists believe

Sarah Knapton, science editor 

19 OCTOBER 2017 • 7:00PM

The British obsession for feeding birds is causing their beaks to grow longer so they can reach into bird feeders, scientists suspect. In an extraordinary example of rapid evolution, researchers have discovered that the UK tit has a beak up to 0.3mm longer than its European counterparts.

Although it sounds like a tiny difference, scientists believe even such a small advantage could aid survival, ensuring those with longer beaks live long enough to lay eggs, and pass on their genes.

Researchers at Oxford University have been studying the Wytham Woods great tit population in Oxfordshire for 70 years and recently spotted that British great tits’ beaks have been getting longer since the 1970s.

Scientists at Oxford also teamed up with researchers from Sheffield University, the University of East Anglia and Dutch experts to also examine whether genes have changed to allow for the longer beaks. They found significant differences in the DNA of British tits compared with those in the Netherlands.

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Record year for breeding Black-winged Stilts in Britain

An unprecedented 13 Black-winged Stilt chicks have fledged in Britain from sites in Kent, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk, including nine on two RSPB reserves.

This breeding success comes after years of conservation work to create the ideal marshy habitat for stilts. The species has become a more frequent sight in recent years, as it has moved from its traditional nesting grounds in southern Europe in search of wetland habitat to raise young. However, fledglings are still extremely rare in Britain, with just a handful of successful breeding attempts in the past decade.

Cliffe Pools RSPB in north Kent proved to be the most productive site for Black-winged Stilts this summer, as two pairs fledged an impressive seven chicks. A further two young fledged from Ouse Washes RSPB, Cambridgeshire, with a final four coming from a nest at Potter Heigham Marshes, a Natural England reserve in Norfolk, making this the most successful breeding season for stilts ever in the country.

Read more

Night herons breed in Britain for the first time

News has just been released by the Wildlife Trusts today that a pair of Black-crowned Night Herons has successfully bred in Britain for the first time ever on one of its reserves.  

Two adults and two recently fledged juveniles are now roosting at Somerset Wildlife Trust’s Westhay Moor NNR on the Somerset Levels, having either bred there or nearby on the Avalon Marshes site. The birds were captured on camera and made their debut on Flickr.

Black-crowned Night Heron is a scarce visitor to Britain, with around 10 or so records each year on average (accounting for occasional fluctuations); only a dozen or so have been reported in Somerset since 1800. With Somerset's recent history of breeding Cattle and Great Egrets and Little Bitterns, this is perhaps a long-overdue event and reaffirms the Avalon Marshes and Somerset Levels' significance as one of the country's most important breeding areas for the heron family and other larger marshland birds.

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Britain’s seabird colonies face catastrophe as warming waters disrupt their food supply

Populations of gannets, puffins and other marine birds are in freefall, but a crucial scientific study to pinpoint the causes is being blocked, say experts

Robin McKieScience editor

Sunday 20 August 2017 00.04 BSTLast modified on Sunday 20 August 2017 09.20 BST

Bempton Cliffs bird reserve was in fine fettle last week. The last of its population of puffins had departed for the winter a few weeks earlier, while its thousands of young gannets were still being cared for by their parents on the chalk cliffs of the East Yorkshire nature site. For good measure, kittiwakes, cormorants and fulmars were also bathing in the sunshine.

It was a comforting sight for any birdwatcher but this benign picture was in stark contrast to many other bird reserves in Britain. Our populations of seabirds – arctic skuas, arctic terns and kittiwakes – are in freefall. And, in some cases, the numbers are dire.

“For reasons that are not entirely clear – though they are almost certainly concerned with climate change – Bempton Cliffs has not suffered from the precipitous declines in seabird numbers that we see elsewhere,” said Euan Dunn, a principal policy officer for the RSPB.

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Fake crane project brings birds back to Britain

November 8, 2016
 
Conservationists dressed in crane costumes have helped bring the graceful grey birds back to Britain's wetlands after they were hunted to near extinction as a delicacy in the Middle Ages.



The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) said the hand-rearing of 93 cranes in Somerset, southwest England, had been "instrumental" in bringing the total number of cranes in Britain to 160.

"It's an incredibly useful technique. It allows you to act as a surrogate parent," Damon Bridge, one of the conservationists who reared chicks from eggs as part of the "Great Crane Project", told AFP.

Wearing grey body suits, Bridge and other bird enthusiasts socialised with and fed the chicks with devices shaped like a crane's head and painted with a bird's face in a programme that ended in 2014.

Bridge said the aim was to prevent chicks from "imprinting" on humans before being released into the wild so they don't rely on people to feed them.

The chicks that were reared in this way have survived in the wild and have now themselves begun breeding.

"The population has probably grown to a size where it has reached a critical mass," said Bridge.

The Great Crane Project is a partnership between the RSPB, the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust and the Pensthorpe Conservation Trust.

"It's a dream come true... Cranes are well on track to become a true conservation success story for the UK," said Rebecca Lee, principal conservation breeding officer at the WWT.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2016-11-fake-crane-birds-britain.html#jCp

Fake crane project brings birds back to Britain
November 8, 2016

The Great Crane Project is a partnership between the RSPB, the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust and the Pensthorpe Conservation Trust

Conservationists dressed in crane costumes have helped bring the graceful grey birds back to Britain's wetlands after they were hunted to near extinction as a delicacy in the Middle Ages.

The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) said the hand-rearing of 93 cranes in Somerset, southwest England, had been "instrumental" in bringing the total number of cranes in Britain to 160.

"It's an incredibly useful technique. It allows you to act as a surrogate parent," Damon Bridge, one of the conservationists who reared chicks from eggs as part of the "Great Crane Project", told AFP.

Wearing grey body suits, Bridge and other bird enthusiasts socialised with and fed the chicks with devices shaped like a crane's head and painted with a bird's face in a programme that ended in 2014.

Bridge said the aim was to prevent chicks from "imprinting" on humans before being released into the wild so they don't rely on people to feed them.

The chicks that were reared in this way have survived in the wild and have now themselves begun breeding.

"The population has probably grown to a size where it has reached a critical mass," said Bridge.

The Great Crane Project is a partnership between the RSPB, the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust and the Pensthorpe Conservation Trust.

"It's a dream come true... Cranes are well on track to become a true conservation success story for the UK," said Rebecca Lee, principal conservation breeding officer at the WWT.

Read more at: 

Britain’s rarest birds of prey are back in the East of England, but where are they nesting?

 16:27 Thursday 12 May 2016

Montagu’s harriers, the UK’s rarest breeding birds of prey, have started arriving back in the country for the summer after spending the winter months in tropical Senegal in West Africa, and the RSPB is asking the public to report any sightings of the birds to help identify new areas where they might be nesting.

Just seven pairs of Montagu’s harriers, known affectionately by bird watchers as ‘Monty’s’, nested in the whole of the UK last year. This is one fewer than in 2014, but scientists studying the birds hope that with the help of farmers, birdwatchers and people out enjoying the countryside, they can find more new Montagu’s harrier nesting sites this year.

Right now is the best time to see Montagu’s harriers as they engage in their spectacular airborne courtship display before they establish their nests and become more secretive. During the courtship, males will climb high into the air and then fold his wings and tumble groundwards in a show of aerobatic prowess designed to impress. Once a pair has chosen a nest site the male will pass food to the female in mid-air, with one or both birds flying upside down momentarily to make the exchange.

Mark Thomas, who leads on Montagu’s harrier conservation work for the RSPB, said: “A Montagu’s harrier’s display is spectacular and really special to witness. It’s so important for these birds that we can find the places where they are nesting and protect them from accidental damage, disturbance and persecution.

“Monty’s are increasingly nesting in cropped arable fields rather than reedbeds, so we’re especially keen to make farmers aware of them and hear from any who think they might have birds nesting in their fields, but anyone who sees one can help us make sure they have the best chance of successfully breeding and rearing their chicks by getting in touch to tell us about their sighting.”

Read more: 

Once in a generation bird arrives back in Britain

HISTORY has repeated itself for delighted twitchers after a long lost bird arrived 30 years to the day it was last spotted in Britain.

By STUART WINTER

PUBLISHED: 00:00, Fri, Oct 16, 2015 | UPDATED: 16:33, Fri, Oct 16, 2015

As the birding community was remembering the previous time a diminutive Wilson's warbler was found on a Cornish headland in 1985, news broke that another one had made landfall.

Dazzling yellow Wilson's warblers are North American songbirds that nest in the vast forests of Canada and spend their winters in Mexico and neighbouring states.

Amazingly, one young bird, weighing little more than a 10p piece, crossed the Atlantic and made landfall near the northernmost tip of the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides.

Fortunately for the birdwatching community, the warbler touched down after its epic non-stop flight in a garden next-door to one of the country's best known ornithologists, Tony Marr.

Tony, who just happened to be hosting a visit from another of the country's leading ornithologists, Roy Dennis, explained how a spot of casual after-lunch birdwatching in a neighbouring garden turned into a history making occasion.

He said: "As we reached the gate into the field behind my neighbour's house, we paused to check the line of bushes which constitutes the shelter belt around his house on this very windy island.

"At 2.20 pm a small bird flew towards us. 'Looks like a goldcrest flying towards us', I said to Roy, as a colourful passerine flew in to the top of a small Sitka spruce near the gate. We both raised our binoculars as the bird landed in the tree. 'Oh ****!' I exclaimed. 'It's a Wilson's Warbler', with which Roy immediately agreed.

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Tight race to find UK's national bird race 'may lead to coalition'

It's a "beak to beak" race between the barn owl, the blackbird, the wren and the robin as a countrywide poll to find Britain's national bird got underway last night

By Javier Espinoza

12:01AM BST 08 May 2015

It's a "beak to beak" race between the barn owl, the blackbird, the wren and the robin as a countrywide poll to find Britain's national bird got underway last night.

Preliminary results, from 160,000 online voters, indicated there might not be a clear winner and a coalition could be formed following intense backstabbing and bickering as the birds got in a flap.

“It is a close fight, they are beak to beak at the moment,” said David Lindo, a birdwatcher and the organiser of the poll, just hours before polling stations closed in roughly 200 schools across the UK and online.

Mr Lindo added that there could possibly be a coalition and there might be a struggle in power leading to "the birds debating among themselves who is going to flock with who.”

There were more than 70,000 votes last year to whittle it down to a shortlist of 10 bird species, which also included the blackbird, blue tit, hen harrier, kingfisher, puffin and red kite.

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This is the one bird that must never represent Britain

Ten candidates are on the shortlist to become our national bird; but one imposter is fast making a bid

By Harry Wallop

6:05AM GMT 17 Mar 2015

There are two national votes on May 7, both involving controversial, scheming and sometimes preening individuals. One is the general election and the other is a poll to find a national bird of Britain. There is little doubt which Britons will enjoy participating in more.

Britain has never had a national bird, but it has a deep-rooted love of the creatures. With 1.1 million on its books, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds has more paid-up members than all of the political parties put together. Birds are not just part of the English language, they are the punctuation marks that measure the passing of time: the first cuckoo of spring, swallow of summer or robin atop a snowy garden fence. Tweet of the Day preceding the Today programme has almost become as much part of Radio 4 as the pips.

David Goode, the author of Nature in Towns and Cities, says: “A love of birds is a very definite British thing. When the great Victorian natural history societies of Manchester or Birmingham organised trips to, say, the Peak District or North Wales they would hire special trains so great was the demand.”

But for all our avian affection, we do not have a national bird. Sweden has the blackbird, Mongolia has the saker falcon, but Britain has no official feathered friend. The vote to rectify this has been proposed by David Lindo, a keen birdwatcher and a passionate believer in birds as a force for good. So far it is an unofficial vote, but he says: “We’re talking to government.”

He drew up a longlist of 60 birds last year. Following hundreds of thousands of online votes, it has been whittled down to 10: barn owl, blackbird, blue tit, hen harrier, kingfisher, mute swan, puffin, red kite, robin and wren.

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Britain's national bird: Red kite, puffin or robin? Voting opens to decide

TOM BAWDEN

ENVIRONMENT EDITOR 

Monday 16 March 2015

America has the bald eagle, France the Gallic rooster and India the peacock – but when it comes to national birds, Britain is notably lacking.

That looks set to change, however, thanks to a campaign devised by a leading ornithologist. David Lindo, the broadcaster also known as “The Urban Birder”, is asking Britons to pick their favourite bird from a shortlist of 10 – including red kites, kingfishers and, of course, robin redbreasts.

Members of the public have until general election day on 7 May to choose which British bird they would like to see represent the country, with barn owls, blue tits, wrens and blackbirds also in the running.

Mr Lindon says he will pass on the result of the vote to the Queen and the new Prime Minister – and lobby them to instate the winner as the UK’s national bird.

“I feel embarrassed as someone who lives in the United Kingdom that we don’t have a national bird. The US has had one since 1776, while places like Sweden, Latvia, Bhutan, Jamaica, Mexico all have one and we haven’t. We’re supposed to be the national leaders when it comes to being animal lovers. It’s high time we put our money where our mouths are,” he said.

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Will Britain's garden birds stay for winter?

Robins are among the birds largely absent from Britain's gardens last winter

Last winter Britain’s gardens were unusually quiet, with their usual visiting birds largely absent. Blackbirds, robins, song thrushes and chaffinches were among the birds that chose to spent their time foraging in the countryside instead of in gardens due to the abundance of food available there.

But a quiet winter was followed by a busier spring and summer, as the warmer weather enjoyed by the UK in 2014 meant that bird numbers were able to pick up quickly, according to findings from the British Trust for Ornithology’s (BTO) Garden BirdWatch.

Now the BTO are keen to find out whether the birds will stay for the colder months, or whether they will once again prefer to spend autumn and winter in the countryside rather than in gardens.

The Trust rely on recordings taken down by their Garden BirdWatch volunteers, who over the past year have provided valuable data that revealed average robin numbers have been higher this year than in the previous two years. BTO say that this could be due to a mild winter and a good breeding season.

Numbers of great tit were also seen to have rapidly increased in May, reaching their highest average numbers in September than in the past seven years. Other birds that were seen to do well in gardens over the summer months included dunnocks, blue tits, and great spotted woodpeckers.

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All of Britain and Ireland’s birds mapped digitally for the first time

April 2014: For the first time ever all of Britain and Ireland’s birds have been mapped digitally. More than 3,500 maps showing the distribution, range change and abundance for over five hundred different species of bird that have been recorded in Britain and Ireland since 1968 can now be accessed on line.

The map shows that the corncrake
has experienced huge habitat loss since 1968

This huge resource has been produced by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO), based on bird records collected by volunteers for bird atlas projects run in partnership with BirdWatch Ireland and the Scottish Ornithologists’ Club (SOC) over a period of more than 40 years.

It illustrates how different species have coped over the last 45 years and which ones have flourished and which have declined. For example it shows how the huge range loss the corncrake has experienced and the spectacular recovery of the Marsh Harrier, which was down to a single breeding pair in the early 70s.Dr Simon Gillings, BTO lead scientist on the project said, “To finally see all these maps in one place is tremendous but it is the ability to toggle between different maps for a species and see its range shrinking or expanding before your eyes that really brings home how some of these species are changing. These maps raise many questions, many of which are addressed in detail in the published bird atlases, but we still have much to learn.”

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/%20birds-mapped-040.html

Common birds ‘dying out in large parts of Britain’

SEVERAL species of once-common birds are becoming extinct across large parts of Britain, a shocking report revealed yesterday.

They include cuckoo, snipe, lapwing and grey partridge – while the corn bunting, once a familiar sight on farmland, is now extinct in Ireland.

In contrast, the latest State Of The UK’s Birds report by the RSPB showed dramatic increases in species such as Canada goose, red kite and avocet.

But since 1995, ­turtle dove numbers have dropped by 95 per cent and willow tit by 85 per cent.

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With BTO study showing changing spread of UK birdlife - what’s in your garden?

The spread of Britain’s bird population has been revealed in more detail than ever before after the results of an ambitious volunteer project were released.

Using information provided by more than 40,000 volunteers from every corner of Britain and Ireland in the last four years, the British Trust for Ornithology’s (BTO) Bird Atlas 2007-11 has mapped the habits of all the UK’s birds in winter and the breeding season.

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