BTO CHIEF'S DOUBTS OVER TURTLE DOVE'S UK BREEDING FUTURE

    ANDY CLEMENTS' ADDRESS TO LINCOLNSHIRE  BIRD CLUB'S AGM

                                                            
THE turtle dove may  become  "lost to Britain as a breeding species".

That was the sombre message from the director of the BTO, Dr Andy Clements, at the annual meeting of Lincolnshire Bird Club where he was guest speaker.

The decline of the species - by 93 per cent since 1994 - been attributed mostly  to loss of its preferred seed foraging habitats both here and in West Africa where it winters, with disease
(notably one caused by the  trichomonosis parasite) and illegal  shooting on its migration routes in southern Europe also thought to be factors.

"It is really sad to see the demise of such a lovely bird," said Andy (pictured below). "It may be too late to save it as a native breeding species."


                                                                     
 
Although nowhere near as much so as the turtle dove, most of the traditional summer migrants to Britain are now in steady decline, with the South-east particularly hard hit.

This deteriorating situation is consistently confirmed every year both by observation and by Birdtrack software and other data-collection technology which now records not just distribution of species but also abundance.

On the plus side, the past 20 years has seen a spectacular increase almost everywhere in the population of buzzards.

Andy also made reference to bittern whose growing readiness to breed in newly-created inland reedbed sites should  help to compensate for the potential loss of traditional coastal haunts whose suitability is being increasingly threatened by saltwater incursion as a result of rising sea levels.

Of smaller species,  meadow pipit data has revealed the huge importance of the whole of Ireland to over-wintering birds.

Andy, a father-of-two, is a University of Bangor BSc graduate who subsequently did postgraduate research at Durham University, then  lectured in zoology at the University of Sussex where he also researched birdsong.

After leaving the academic world, he spent 24 years at the Nature Conservancy Council, an advisory agency to the Government, where his activities included fieldwork on upland birds, communications, liaising with European Union partners and helping to  secure National  Lottery funds for community wildlife projects.

Andy also had spells both with  the Department of the Environment and English Nature, and, in early 2006, he was one of those instrumental in setting up Natural England on whose board he still sits.

Since taking over the reins at the BTO 10 years ago, he has seen membership increase from 12,500 to about 20,000 and raised the profile of the organisation, not least in influencing Goverrnment policy.

During his presentation, at Horncastle's  Admiral Rodney Hotel, he described how most of Britain's songbird migrants are now arriving on our shores significantly earlier than in the past in order to take advantage of insects which are emerging earlier as a result of climate change.

Two notable exceptions, however, are the swift and the cuckoo where preliminary evidence suggests that they pause prior to the most perilous  part of their northward migration - over the Sahara - to fuel up  on flying insects and termites

However, they have to await these creatures' emergence which first needs to be triggered by heavy rainfall.

Andy could not emphasise enough the importance these African rains. If they do not occur, the impact can be severe for migrants - a notable example occurring in the 1970s when there was a "catastrophic collapse" in whitethroat numbers.

Much of the focus of Andy's talk fell on the cuckoo (pictured) which, as he pointed out, spends far more time in the African jungle - sometimes in the company of such exotic species as gorillas - than it does in Britain where its breeding sojourn is all to short.
                                               
                                                         

Tagging adult males with satellite transmitters has come up with some fascinating information.

Individual birds tagged within 100 km of each other in East Anglia have been found to take highly divergent migration routes south - some through Italy and some through Spain.

Remarkably, they  all end their journey  with 100km miles of each other in Africa.

Why different routes should be chosen is not clear,  but the identity of the individual host species which rears them as chicks is apparently of no significance.

What routes do the female cuckoos take? As yet, the answer to this is also unknown. 
 
They are lighter than males - too light to allow satellite tagging which is only allowed if the weight  of the device attached is up to a maximum of three per cent of a bird's body weight.

In the past, the BTO tend to channel most of its communication activities towards Government agencies, but Andy is keen to broaden its outreach to the wider community. He is determined that the welfare of birds should be in the public eye - especially if there is a chance of co-operation between nations helping to ease political discord.

However, for this to effective, he said: "Society needs to care."

In his resolve to spread  the message about birds in the media, the organisation has had  some success in obtaining coverage both in national newspapers such as The Independent and  on social media such as Twitter.

With iconic species such as cuckoo and nightingale, the chances of stirring public response are favourable.

Much more of a challenge is posed by, say, the rapidly-declining spotted flycatcher - loved and cherished by all birders but whose unspectacular plumage and thin song is unlikely to be of wider appeal.

Does society care? If so, to what extent?

For the answers to these and other questions only time will tell.

Following his fascinating and infomative talk, Andy was warmly applauded  by members  and thanked by the chairman of the LBC, Phil Espin.


* The BTO is at: www.bto.org/

* Lincolnshire Bird Club is at: www.lincsbirdclub.co.uk/

Turtle Dove: Photo by Yuvair via Wikimedia Commons

Cuckoo: Photo  by Chris Romeiks via Wikimedia Commons

BTO YORK CONFERENCE: CRAIG RALSTON, ANDY MUSGROVE, RICH BURKMAR, DAWN BALMER, GREG CONWAY

Craig Ralston (left) and other  delegates at the York conference

          

KEYNOTE speaker at the BTO conference in York was Craig Ralston, senior reserves manager for Natural England.

His hour-long presentation was on management of  the Lower Derwent Valley National Nature Reserve in East Yorkshire. He described it as “a jewel”. 

The reserve is a particularly strong habitat  for wildfowl, and Craig enthused  about the high numbers (up to 700 birds in winter) of one of his favourite species, pintail. 

Gadwall used to be infrequent visitors, but now they are widespread, second only to mallard when it comes to the reserve's breeding ducks. 

Shoveler - plentiful on the reserve, especially in winter

By contrast, the past 20 years has seen “a massive decline” in Bewick’s swans, not because of deficiencies in the reserve’s management but because birds that used to come to the UK are responding to climate change by wintering in Holland, Germany and Denmark.

Whooper swan - always a pleasure to see in winter

                                 

The reserve is also an important migration stopping off point for many waders, including whimbrel, which spend much of summer in Iceland and winter in Guinea.

Craig is keen to spread the word about Natural England’s successes as widely as possible in order to encourage people, adults and children alike, to enjoy wildlife.

“A job is only half done until you tell people about it,” he insisted.

To this end, he or colleagues regularly visit schools, and, from time to time, he has even donned a fancy dress whimbrel outfit to promote the cause at public events in town and city centres.

“To show that  we take health and safety seriously, there is always a cork on the tip of the whimbrel’s bill,” he joked.

The conference, held on March 18 at York University’s Ron Cooke Hub, also heard from Rich Burkmar, of the Field Studies Council, on latest QGIS computer mapping technology, and from the BTO’s  Andy Musgrove on how to make the most of the Birdtrack app for computers and smartphones.

Leeds-born Andy has been a birder ever since childhood when the bird that probably hooked him was a visit to the garden by a fieldfare, a bird he had never seen before.

He became an obsessive note-taker and has scores of diaries recording his finds.

But the onset of Birdtrack has made the process of recording a much slicker and more sophisticated process. What is more, the information is shared across the birding and scientific community.

The data overall has confirmed much, for instance, that, compared with yesteryear,  most of our summer birds are now arriving, on average 10 days earlier in spring  and leaving 10 days later in autumn.

Asked by a delegate to name the ever-elusive bird on the British list which he would most like to see, back came Andy's reply: Wilson’s petrel.

There were also excellent presentations from two of Andy’s BTO colleagues, Greg Conway and Dawn Balmer.

Greg described how efforts were being made - where landowners granted permission - to assess the importance of upland farmland (typically sloped sites between moorland and grass fields) for breeding waders such as snipe, oystercatcher, redshank, lapwing, curlew and golden plover.

The prospects do not look particularly rosy because chicks, if not nests, are vulnerable to intensive silage  management and many landowners refuse “point blank” to cooperate on conservation initiatives.

Dawn (originally from Shropshire but married to a Yorkshireman) is head of surveys at BTO and also a member of the Rare Bird Breeding Panel.

She observed that breeding of some species, such as teal, water rail and hobby, were not well recorded and more information was always welcome.

Perhaps controversially, she suggested that - in the case of water rail - the brief use of callback  was acceptable if done for scientific purposes rather than as a means to obtain a better photograph.

According to Dawn, there are about 80 species that fall in the category of rare breeders - that is to say, fewer than 2,000 pairs.

These are divided into: 

* Very rare (fewer than 30 pairs) such as wood sandpiper

* Rare (between 30 and 300 pairs) such as black-necked grebe

* Scarce (between 301 and 1,000 pairs) such as pochard- 302- 1000 pochard

* Less scarce (between 1001 and 2000 pairs) such as avocet 

There are also some species - such as little bittern, great reed warbler and scarlet rosefinch - which are classified as occasional breeders.

Some species, such as red kite (of which there estimated to be about 2,500 pairs) have now come off the panel’s list entirely. 

 

Mike Brown (left), introduces BTO regional  representatives

A stall selling secondhand books on birds provided additional interest

BTO YORK CONFERENCE: JUDE'S VITAL RESEARCH ON GANNET FLIGHT BEHAVIOUR

                                                         

Jude Lane - from hen harriers to gannets

FASCINATING insights into the flight behaviour of gannets were a feature of the presentation to this month’s York BTO regional conference by Jude Lane.

Jude, who has a MSc in Biodversity and who has worked for the RSPB ( monitoring and protecting breeding hen harriers on upland estates), is now in her third year as a PhD student at Leeds University.

Her work on gannets is largely focusing on the colonies at Ailsa Cragg and Bass Rock, and she is using GPS tracking technology to build on observation from boats (which can only be conducted in favourable weather).

                                

Nesting gannets - these birds are at Bempton in Yorkshire

                                  

Her particular interests are in the varying heights at which gannets fly and the behaviour of immature birds prior to breeding.

The commuting flights of gannets are typically “fast and straight” while their foraging flights are “short and twisting”.

When diving for fish, females favour a deep v-shaped plunge, while males are more likely to adopt a shallower u-shape. 

When they make outward foraging flights from nests, the height above water averages 19.8 metres while, on return (while carrying food), the height dips to 13.4 metres. 

Jude is particularly keen to discover the potential impact of existing and proposed wind farms on gannets - both collision risk and displacement from their preferred fishing waters.

Once completed and published, her research is likely to be of significant interest to wind energy developers and Government authorities as well as to environmentalists and groups such as the BTO and the RSPB.

                                                     

The Ron Cooke hub at York University where Jude addressed the March 18 BTO regional conference 

BTO YORK CONFERENCE: WHAT FUTURE FOR YORKSHIRE'S BLACK GROUSE POPULATION?

                                    

THE spotlight fell on larger birds at this month’s BTO regional conference held at York University.

The first presentation came from former Harrogate man Phil Warren who has spent the past 18 years researching moorland species.

His special expertise is with black grouse, and he is now pioneering initiatives by the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust to expand its range in northern England.

The bird has been having a bad time of it for at least the past 25 years - probably much longer.

In 1990, the UK population was reckoned to number some 25,000 males, but, by the last count in 2005, this had fallen to 5,078.

“That’s a staggering and depressing decline,” said Phil.

In Northumberland’s Kielder Forest, the birds were once - in the years before the conifer saplings became established - so common as to be regarded by some as a “pest”.

But once the canopy formed, the habitat changed and the bird  has now almost been lost as a breeder.  

On the plus side - at least in parts of North Yorkshire - the species has held up.

Continued Phil: “If you’re driving through the Pennines, there is a good chance that any black dots you see are more likely to be black grouse than carrion crows.”

The species is famous for the springtime lekking displays of the males. Leks can consist of just a single bird up to 36, but the typical number is six.

In Scandinavia, leks sometimes occur on frozen lakes.

In the UK, the black grouse retains its status as a “game bird”, despite is fragile population, but there is voluntarily moratorium on shooting by estate owners.

In instances, where individual females (grey hens) - which are not dissimilar from their red grouse counterparts - are shot, a fine is imposed, with the money channelled into conservation work.

 A challenge for Phil and colleagues is that, though survival rates for young birds are “good”, breeding productivity overall is low, with an average of just 1.3 chicks per nest. 

 

The trust is keen to encourage the spread of scrubby woodland, a favoured habitat, not least because it provides a roosting habitat.   

There is also need to encourage sawflies because the larvae are an essential part of the chicks’ diet.

Because of unfavourable habitat or other pressures, there is little prospect of the species being able to extend its Pennine population to the immediate north, east or west, so Phil and colleagues have been focusing on potential areas in parts of the Yorkshire Dales.

“There are indications that translocation may be a useful tool,”continued Phil.

One problem is that, though females disperse after breeding, males are sedentary and return to the same lekking sites of their forebears.

The first translocation exercises failed because the males involved simply returned.

The lesson that has emerged is that project birds - they are caught, after dark, by lamping - need to be transferred  at least 15km away to discourage any attempts to return.

Sites north-west of Hawes and in Upper Nidderdale have been identified as potentially worthwhile as part of range extension efforts.

In response to a question about predator control, Phil said that stoats, weasels and rats were the principle targets.

What about harriers?

“Birds of prey are protected,” he replied.

More information about  the black grouse and efforts to extend its population are featured on the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust’s website: www.gwct.org.uk 

Delegates at the BTO regional conference held at York University on March 18

NEXT: Jude Lane on gannets