Community | April 24, 2011 | 17 comments

Spring bird populations in the UK are declining drastically as scientists look for explanation

source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/apr/24/birds-spring-population-decline

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JanforGore
Some of Britain's most cherished spring visitors are disappearing in the thousands. Ornithologists say species such as the cuckoo, nightingale and turtle dove are undergoing catastrophic drops in numbers, although experts are puzzled about the exact reasons for these declines.

The warning, from the RSPB, comes as the songs of the cuckoo, nightingale and wood warbler herald the return of spring. In the case of the cuckoo – "the simple bird that thinks two notes a song", according to the poet William Henry Davies – its call has become synonymous with the arrival of warm weather. It is the quintessential bird of spring.

Yet there is now a real risk that, with other migrant birds from Africa, it may no longer make its annual appearance in our woodlands, said Dr Danaë Sheehan, a senior RSPB conservation scientist. The call of the cuckoo could be silenced in the near future unless scientists can unravel the causes of the drastic decline in their population, she said.

According to Sheehan, numbers of migrant birds from Africa have declined dramatically in the UK since 1995. For turtle doves the figure is 71%; nightingales, 53%; and cuckoos, 44%. "That is a very significant and very worrying decline," she added.

"The real problem is that there are so many different possible causes for these losses – which makes it difficult to tease out the factors involved in their decline and to prepare plans to put things right.

"These losses could be the result of changes in farmland use in Britain which are affecting the way these birds breed when they arrive here in spring. Or they could be due to the spread of human populations in Africa and the destruction of natural habitats where they make their homes in winter.

"Climate change is almost certainly involved as well. Our problem is to unravel those different causes and assess how they interact."

In a bid to explain what is happening, the RSPB and groups such as the British Trust for Ornithology have launched a series of projects in the UK and in Africa. These include new surveys of numbers of different species arriving in Britain as well as studies, in Africa, of sites that provide winter homes for these birds. Targets will include the cuckoo, nightingale and the turtle dove as well as the wood warbler, garden warbler, whinchat, and pied flycatcher as well as the swift – another popular visitor. Its numbers have dropped 30% since 1995.

"The global pressure for land has now become extreme, and it is starting to have real implications for long-distance migrant birds," said Andre Farrar, the RSPB's campaigns manager. "Climate change – which affects timings of breeding cycles – is another critical factor."

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17 comments // Spring bird populations in the UK are declining drastically as scientists look for explanation

  • artemis6
    • 0
      artemis6  

    • This is not good . Birds are always a reliable messenger of the environment . Something is very wrong and it may be us .

    • 1 year ago
  • tommic
    • +1
      tommic  

    • There has been well documented cases now worldwide of massive unexplained birds die offs. From the Gulf of Mexico to New Zealand, from Russia to Africa. Although a semi normal occurence from one decade to another, this time it's happening all over the world in a very short duration. Just not a good omen for any reason from viruis to bacteria or chemical, no matter how it's described it spells a bad omen

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
    • 0
      Gravity_Man  

    • So, scientists can't recognize the growing numbers of Coal Mine Canary eh? Very interesting. I knew they were blind as bats, just didn't know to what degree they had been afflicted.

      Now we know. And if there's a dollar in it for them the canaries Live, no dollars in it => Good-Bye to the nuisance little things

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
    • 0
      Gravity_Man  

    • I heard a partial news report this morning didn't catch the state but he said Berkeley. Is there a Berkeley in Illinois? It was scary what he said => the tornado appeared to GROW MORE POWERFUL AS IT TRAVELED ALONG.

      This is NOT the best news I've ever heard.

    • 1 year ago
  • letsliveinpeace
  • JanforGore
    • +1
      JanforGore  
    • letsliveinpeace:

      You're welcome. This is an important sign regarding biodiversity and the web of life. I too think biodistress is one of the main drivers here, as well as landgrabs that are now deforesting huge swaths of land to grow GMOS for ethanol plus deforestation in general. Our ways are killing our web of life, and sooner or later that will reach up to us. These are the subtle signs we need to be aware of.

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
    • 0
      Gravity_Man  
    • JanforGore:

      Jan, when the gasoline reaches $5.xx a gallon it's going to become suddenly a lucrative endeavor to drill baby drill the US like Moon Cheese once again. Hopefully a fraction of that will be turned into building more Nissan Leaf factories, or pretty solar flower pots, whichever they can make the most money off of.

      The US could garner the world flower pot market.

    • 1 year ago
  • JanforGore
    • 0
      JanforGore  
    • Gravity_Man:

      Yes that's what the final denominator always is: money. Maybe when our soil is fully degraded and barren and our water too polluted and scare to grow food, they will find a way to eat their damned money.

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
    • 0
      Gravity_Man  
    • JanforGore:

      I dislike money because of all the employers I worked so hard for, improved on their sales and so on, in return they underpaid me, squeezed my family, we bought our stuff from beside-the-road Yard Sales, so they could look big in their churches come every Sunday making big sounds dropping my pay into their donation plates.

      Had I not been so incredibly ill all my life, and had caught on a lot sooner to the "game", they would've used yard sales for their clothes and kid's toys also.

      If perchance Obama was to eliminate every Owner of every business and give company ownership over to employees it would be a terrific present to me.

      It won't happen, but if it did I'd be standing on the roof of my car even in snow and pouring rain laughing my head off for at least one week. Good riddance to em. Capitalism for us sucked rotten eggs every minute and every second of the day.

      => and take their pickle~trickle theories with em down the slide.
      => and take their pickle~trickle theories with em down the slide.
      => and take their pickle~trickle theories with em down the slide.
      => and take their pickle~trickle theories with em down the slide.
      => and take their pickle~trickle theories with em down the slide.

    • 1 year ago
  • Gravity_Man
  • letsliveinpeace
    • +1
      letsliveinpeace  
    • Image

    • The nightingale is one of the spring visitors whose decline in numbers is generating concern among experts. A beautiful bird. That's a shame they are dropping in numbers.

    • 1 year ago
  • JanforGore
  • totally_dilapidated
  • northernexpat
    • +1
      northernexpat  

    • Same thing is happening in the Northwest Territories as well. We are losing a lot of our native birds and seeing others that have never flown so far North before. I saw a special on the Wetlands in Ontario were they are also seeing a drastic drop in the population of native birds. When animals and birds start becoming distinct then you know you are in trouble. What are we going to do when the honey bee completely disappears? How are we going to continue pollenating our food supply?

      Unfortunately, with the political discourse going on right now the environment is taking a back seat. It's like everything else, people wait until it's too late before they worry about something this important.

    • 1 year ago
  • JanforGore
  • northernexpat
    • +1
      northernexpat  
    • JanforGore:

      I agree. And you can see by the low number of comments that many people do not consider this an important issue. Keep up the posts, maybe it will finally sink in that we are killing earth and mother nature will finally take her revenge on all of us. Do people not realize that the severe weather happening more and more because of all the pollutents release into the air, water, and food supply?

    • 1 year ago
  • JanforGore
    • +2
      JanforGore  
    • northernexpat:

      Thanks, I do find it disheartening, because the signs are in nature if we would only look there. But we will continue to pollute, toxify and strip this Earth until there is nothing left, then wonder what happened.

    • 1 year ago
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