BTO - British Trust for Ornithology - Biodiversity

The State of the UK's Birds 2020

WSKELLORN — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 13:35:42 +0000

The Cuckoo cohort of 2024 takes flight!

Burns, F., Eaton, M.A., Balmer, D.E., Banks, A., Caldow, R., Donelan, J.L., Douse, A., Duigan, C., Foster, S., Frost, T., Grice, P.V., Hall, C., Hanmer, H.J., Harris, S.J., Johnstone, I., Lindley, P., McCulloch, N., Noble, D.G., Risely, K., Robinson, R.A. & Wotton, S. Our volunteers: the beating heart of BTO data

SUKB collates data from annual, periodic and one-off surveys and monitoring studies of birds, such as the Breeding Bird Survey (BBS), Rare Breeding Birds Panel (RBBP), the Wetland Bird Survey (WeBS), Seabird Monitoring Programme (SMP) and Goose and Swan Monitoring Programme (GSMP). In addition, the 2020 report also includes results from the Nest Record Scheme, Constant Effort Sites (CES) Scheme and Re-trapping Adults for Survival (RAS) Scheme, the latter two schemes collecting demographic information through the efforts of bird ringers.

The report takes information from these and other schemes, research and surveys and delivers information at a country-specific scale, as well as providing an overview for the UK as a whole.

Volunteers play an essential role in bird monitoring in the UK, by donating their time, energy and expertise. The data they collect are vital for conservation, tracking changes in populations and supporting policy development. This year, many monitoring schemes have been adversely affected by the global COVID-19 pandemic and we want to say a special thank you to all of our volunteers for their continued support through this difficult time. Their skill, effort and dedication deserve huge recognition. Sarah Harris, BBS National Organiser

Woodland species

This year’s report highlights the continuing poor fortunes of the UK’s woodland birds. The UK Wild Bird Populations Indicator for woodland species show a long-term decline of 27% since the early 1970s, with declines of 7% evident over just the last five years. More worryingly, when looking at individual trends within the report, some specialist woodland birds have declined dramatically, including Willow Tit with a 94% decline since 1970 as illustrated by the joint Common Birds Census / Breeding Bird Survey UK-wide trend.

After worrying declines in breeding Tawny owl populations were flagged-up by the Breeding Bird Survey, BTO launched targeted survey work on this species during 2018 and 2019. SUKB reports on some of the results from this research, which revealed a decline in site occupancy from 65% in 2005 to 53% in 2018/19. The BTO work has also sought to understand some of the reasons for this change in fortunes.

Results at different scales

Data from many of the surveys covered in SUKB also feed into European-wide schemes and the SUKB report goes from celebrating the publication of the latest European Breeding Bird Atlas, through to finer-scale country-specific results and research. Not bad for an 80 page report!

Country-specific headlines include increases in House Sparrow populations in Wales, where work is also taking place to address the pronounced decline in Curlew numbers. In Scotland, the fragile status of Corncrake is highlighted, alongside increases in farmland species such as Tree Sparrow and Yellowhammer. The Northern Ireland pages look into changing fortunes of seabirds and explore how proposed marine Special Protection Areas may be used to tackling the observed decline. The Northern Ireland pages also examine declines in wintering geese, such as Light-bellied Brent Goose. Finally, over to England and promising results for Stone Curlew conservation work, as well as reporting back on the English Winter Bird Survey for which 1,485 sites were surveyed by volunteers to help us understand the value of agri-environment options.

As in previous reports, we hear about species from 14 UK Overseas Territories and three Crown Dependencies – including Black-browed Albatross, St Helena Plover and South Georgia Pipit, about the Gough Island Restoration Programme, and discover that 69 species in the Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies are now Globally Threatened.

Closer to home, 25 years of BTO Garden BirdWatch is also celebrated, with Goldfinch now the 8th most commonly recorded garden bird, up from 20th back in 1995.

Volunteers

There is a common theme in this report: volunteers. The sheer enormity of their contributions to bird monitoring as a whole is evident throughout this report. Most of the surveys and schemes covered here are only possible thanks to the dedication and skills of the thousands of volunteers who give up their time to help monitor birds and in turn, inform conservation action. Thank you.

Who produces this report?

SUKB 2020 is produced by a coalition of three NGOs: the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) and the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust (WWT), together with the UK’s statutory nature conservation bodies: Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, Northern Ireland (DAERA), the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC), Natural England (NE), Natural Resources Wales (NRW) and NatureScot.

Breeding Bird Survey

Anonymous — Fri, 02 Feb 2018 11:46:31 +0000

The Breeding Bird Survey is the main scheme for monitoring the population changes of the UK’s common and widespread breeding birds. The survey involves two early-morning spring visits to a 1-km square, to count all the birds you see or hear while walking two parallel 1-km lines across the square.

Breeding Bird SurveyButterfly Monitoring Friday, April 1, 1994 - 00:00

BBS monitors the population changes of 118 breeding bird species across the UK thanks to the dedication of almost 3,000 volunteers who survey their randomly selected 1-km square each spring.

The BTO/JNCC/RSPB Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) is the main scheme for monitoring the population changes of the UK’s common and widespread breeding birds, producing population trends for 118 bird and nine mammal species.

The survey involves a recce visit and two early-morning spring visits to an allocated 1-km square, to count all the birds you see or hear while walking two 1-km lines across the square and record any nest counts for colonial nesting birds in the square.

You can optionally record mammals and visit your square later in the season to survey for butterflies. There is the option to return data on paper, via field recording forms or to submit your data on BBS-Online.

Support the future of our birds

Our surveys are vital. The data they produce help us drive positive change for the UK’s birds.

But increased pressure on funding is putting our surveys and data at risk – which is why we need your support.

Donate today

bbs-report-2022-cover.jpg

Read the latest BBS report

The Breeding Bird Survey started in 1994, and a report is produced every year containing population changes and other results from the scheme.

The 2022 Breeding Bird Survey Report reveals a mixed picture, especially for birds which breed in farmland habitats.

Read the 2022 Breeding Bird Survey report

How to take part

Find out how to request a square and what the survey entails.

Results

Explore the results from the data BBS volunteers provide.

Mammal recording

Find out how to record mammals during your BBS visits.

Count butterflies on your BBS square

Take part in the Wider Countryside Butterfly Survey by making additional visits to your BBS square.

How to enter BBS data online

Instructions and video tutorials on submitting your BBS data.

Download BBS forms

Download and print BBS recording forms instructions and recording forms.

Support the future of our birds

Our surveys are vital. The data they produce help us drive positive change for the UK’s birds.

But increased pressure on funding is putting our surveys and data at risk – which is why we need your support.

Donate today

Take part in BBS - counting for conservation

David White

James Heywood

February – March Forms sent or downloaded
March Reconnaissance visit
Early April – mid May Early visit
Mid May – late June Late visit
May – August Wider Countryside Butterfly Survey
End of August Data entry deadline

Undertake three site visits between April and June - a recce and two morning visits, along with data entry. Able to identify UK breeding birds by sight, song and call. If you have the necessary bird ID skills to take part in the Breeding Bird Survey but want to learn more about survey methods, there are a number of BTO training courses covering this subject.

ongoing Farmland birdsUpland birdsWoodland birdsOther species volunteers

BTO Urban AppealWider Countryside Butterfly SurveyAssessing agri-environment schemes No bbs@bto.org

Using butterfly survey data to model habitat associations in urban developments

VIOLA.ROSS-SMITH — Mon, 04 Dec 2023 11:24:45 +0000

The Cuckoo cohort of 2024 takes flight!

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Cooper, J.E.J., Plummer, K.E., Middlebrook, I. & Siriwardena, G.M. Journal of Applied Ecology 10.1111/1365-2664.14583

1. One approach for measuring the potential biodiversity in new urban construction projects is through ecological models that predict how wildlife will respond. For the United Kingdom, such models have only been developed for birds, but to maximise the extent to which models represent overall biodiversity, species from different indicator groups must be considered.

2. Here, we assess this possibility for butterflies by combining citizen science survey data with high-resolution digital maps. We derive detailed characteristics of urban landscapes around survey sites using previously established methods and quantify their relationship to counts of adults of 18 butterfly species in urban and peri-urban settings.

3. Higher butterfly counts were found when traversing urban sites with larger areas of semi-natural grassland, other managed greenspaces, and adjacent arable land. Most of the butterfly community were found to have negative relationships with highly built-up or fragmented landscapes.

4. We found high species-specificity for different details of urban form, particularly in habitat elements such as gardens, vegetation around railways, and grass verges.

5. Policy implications: Improving biodiversity is now part of legislation governing new construction projects from England and Wales. However, predicting quantitative changes from hypothetical land-use modifications remains challenging. Our models provide the foundation through which butterfly abundance could be integrated into an urban biodiversity assessment tool, providing species- and community-level statistics to non-specialists from the urban planning and design sector. This would allow them to hone configurations for built surfaces, private gardens, greenspaces, and wildlife areas and assess their capacity to provide residents with the intended access to nature.

The authors thank the hundreds of volunteers who have contributed to the Wider Countryside Butterfly Survey (WCBS) and the UKBMS partnership who manage the surveys: Butterfly Conservation (BC), Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC), UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH), and British Trust for Ornithology (BTO). This project was funded by a partnership with the BTO, CEH and JNCC. MasterMap data were provided by the EDINA Digimap Ordnance Survey Service, (May 2017).

Linking climate warming and land conversion to species’ range changes across Great Britain

VIOLA.ROSS-SMITH — Mon, 06 Nov 2023 10:29:10 +0000

The Cuckoo cohort of 2024 takes flight!

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Suggitt, A.J., Wheatley, C.J., Aucott, P., Beale, C.M., Fox, R., Hill, J.K., Isaac, N.J.B., Martay, B., Southall, H., Thomas, C.D., Walker, K.J. & Auffret , A.G. Nature Communications 10.1038/s41467-023-42475-0 Although increased temperatures are known to reinforce the effects of habitat destruction at local to landscape scales, evidence of their additive or interactive effects is limited, particularly over larger spatial extents and longer timescales. To address these deficiencies, we created a dataset of land-use changes over 75 years, documenting the loss of over half (>3000 km²) the semi-natural grassland of Great Britain. Pairing this dataset with climate change data, we tested for relationships to distribution changes in birds, butterflies, macromoths, and plants (n = 1192 species total). We show that individual or additive effects of climate warming and land conversion unambiguously increased persistence probability for 40% of species, and decreased it for 12%, and these effects were reflected in both range contractions and expansions. Interactive effects were relatively rare, being detected in less than 1 in 5 species, and their overall effect on extinction risk was often weak. Such individualistic responses emphasise the importance of including species-level information in policies targeting biodiversity and climate adaptation. The authors thank the many thousands of volunteer surveyors of land use and biodiversity, without whom these analyses would not have been possible. Data and imagery from the Land-Utilisation Survey of Great Britain are reproduced with permission of the copyright holder Giles N. Clark. Chris Fleet at National Library of Scotland provided assistance with land-use maps covering Scotland, and Natural England provided assistance with maps covering England and Wales. This work was supported by a UKRI Natural Environment Research Council grant (NE/M013030/1, for A.J.S., J.K.H. and C.D.T.), a Northumbria University Vice Chancellor’s Senior Research Fellowship (for A.J.S.), and grants from the Swedish Research Councils Formas and VR (2015-1065 and 2020-04276, for A.G.A.).

State of Nature report 2023

MIKETOMS — Tue, 26 Sep 2023 09:07:03 +0000

The Cuckoo cohort of 2024 takes flight!

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Burns, F., Mordue, S., al Fulaij, N., Boersch-Supan, P.H., Boswell, J., Boyd, R.J., Bradfer-Lawrence, T., de Ornellas, P., de Palma, A., de Zylva, P., Dennis, E.B., Foster, S., Gilbert, G., Halliwell, L., Hawkins, K., Haysom, K.A., Holland, M.M., Hughes, J., Jackson, A.C., Mancini, F., Mathews, F., McQuatters-Gollop, A., Noble, D.G., O’Brien, D., Pescott, O.L., Purvis, A., Simkin, J., Smith, A., Stanbury, A.J., Villemot, J., Walker, K.J., Walton, P., Webb, T.J., Williams, J., Wilson, R. & Gregory, R.D.

Trends in butterfly populations in UK gardens - new evidence from citizen science monitoring

MIKETOMS — Mon, 22 May 2023 13:28:23 +0000

The Cuckoo cohort of 2024 takes flight!

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Plummer, K.E., Dadam, D., Brereton, T., Dennis, E.B., Massimino, D., Risely, K., Siriwardena, G.M. & Toms, M.P. Insect Conservation and Diversity 10.1111/icad.12645 Private gardens are recognised as potentially important refugia for butterflies. Yet little is known about how gardens might be contributing to butterfly conservation, as their restricted accessibility has meant that garden habitats are not well-represented in traditional monitoring schemes. Garden BirdWatch (GBW) is the UK’s largest structured bird survey, comprising over 25 years of weekly bird counts from more than 14,000 gardens, predominantly occupying suburban and rural locations. Since 2007, a subset of GBW participants have additionally recorded the weekly abundances of butterflies. Using data for 14 seasons (2007–2020) from 7971 gardens with consistent butterfly monitoring, we present the first garden-specific, national trends for 22 widespread butterfly species (37% of all UK butterflies). Half of the species investigated increased significantly in abundance in gardens between 2007 and 2020. Conversely, only one species, Wall (Lasiommata megera), showed a marginal reduction, though this change was not statistically significant. A strong, positive association between these new, habitat-focused trends and those for UK butterflies more broadly, previously reported by the UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme (UKBMS), indicates that patterns of abundance in gardens are largely a reflection of the changes that are occurring nationally. However, butterflies do appear to be faring better in gardens compared to the wider landscape. Averaging trends across non-migratory species revealed that GBW recorded significantly greater increases over time than UKBMS. Effective monitoring of butterflies in gardens can produce reliable and informative population trends, and it provides important evidence of the significant role gardens play in sustaining butterfly populations. BTO Garden BirdWatch is funded by its participants through an annual subscription and additional donations, and would not be possible without their generosity and support. This analysis was funded through the Garden BirdWatch Research Appeal and we are very grateful to those who donated so generously to the Appeal. We would like to note our particular thanks to John McCaig, whose interest in and support of this research has been especially generous. Thanks also to Clare Simm for her involvement in the earlier stages of this work, and other GBW and IS staff and volunteers for help with data processing and logistical support. Wider Countryside Butterfly SurveyPatterns and causes of covariation in bird and butterfly community structure A niche-based approach for evaluating the mechanisms of community stability in butterfly communities across three countries

Farmland practices are driving bird population decline across Europe

MIKETOMS — Fri, 12 May 2023 14:39:25 +0000

The Cuckoo cohort of 2024 takes flight!

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Rigala, S., Dakos, V., Alonso, H., Auniņš, A., Benkőe, Z., Brotons, L., Chodkiewicz, T., Chylareck, P., de Carlil, E., del Moral, J.C., Domșa, C., Escandell, V., Fontaine, B., Foppen, R., Gregory, R., Harris, S., Herrando, S., Husby, M., Leronymidou C., Jiguet, J., Kennedy, J., Klvaňová, A., Kmecl, P., Kuczyński, L. , Kurlavičius, P., Kålås J.A., Lehikoinen, A., Lindström, Å, Lorrillière, R., Moshø, C., Nellis, R., Noble, D., Eskildsen, D.P., Paquet, J-Y., Pelissié, M., Pladevall, C., Portolou, D., Reif, J., Schmid, H., Seaman, B., Szabo, Z.D., Szép, T., Florenzano, G.T., Teufelbauer, N., Trautmann, S., van Turnhout, C., Vermouzek, Z., Vikstrøm, T., Voříšek, P., Weiserbs, A. & Devictor, V. PNAS 10.1073/pnas.2216573120

Declines in European bird populations are reported for decades, but the direct effect of major anthropogenic pressures on such declines remains unquantified. Causal relationships between pressures and bird population responses are difficult to identify as pressures interact at different spatial scales and responses vary among species. Here, we uncover direct relationships between population time series of 170 common bird species, monitored at more than 20,000 sites in 28 European countries, over 37 years, and four widespread anthropogenic pressures, namely agricultural intensification, change in forest cover, urbanization, and climate change (focusing on temperature), over the last decades. We quantify the influence of each pressure on bird population time series as well as its importance relative to other pressures, and we identify the traits of most affected species. We find that agricultural intensification, in particular pesticides and fertilizer use, is the main pressure for most bird population declines, especially for invertebrate feeders. Responses to changes in forest cover, urbanization, and temperature are more species specific. Specifically, forest cover is associated with a positive effect on population dynamics, growing urbanization is associated with a negative effect on population dynamics, while temperature change has an effect on the dynamics of a large number of bird populations, the magnitude and direction of which depend on species’ thermal preferences. Our results not only confirm the pervasive and strong effects of anthropogenic pressures on common breeding birds, but also quantify the relative strength of these effects, stressing the urgent need for transformative changes in the way of inhabiting the world in European countries, if bird populations shall have a chance of recovering.

What role do protected areas play in the future of bird conservation?

WEBSITEEDITOR — Fri, 28 Apr 2023 13:35:54 +0000

The UK has many different kinds of protected area, but how effective are they for bird conservation?

‘Protected area’ is an umbrella term for a site that falls under particular regional, national or international protection. Some of these sites have been established specifically to protect the wildlife found there, like Natura 2000 sites and nature reserves run by conservation NGOs. Many protect geology, landscapes, farming practices or historical landmarks instead, such as Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty and National Parks. With finite resources available for biodiversity conservation, it’s vital that we know whether investment in protected areas is worthwhile.

With finite resources available for biodiversity conservation, it’s vital that we know whether investment in protected areas is worthwhile.

BTO is uniquely placed to investigate the impact of protected areas on birds. Our vast dataset, which incorporates information from our volunteer surveys such as the BTO/JNCC/RSPB Breeding Bird Survey, the BTO/RSPB/JNCC Wetland Bird Survey and the Bird Ringing Scheme, covers a wide range of geographic areas in the UK, allowing us to compare bird population trends in protected areas with trends in the wider countryside.

These comparisons allow us to explore several questions. Are bird populations benefitting from protected areas? If so, by how much? And, perhaps most importantly, are protected areas enough to save species threatened with further decline and extinction in the UK?

Do bird populations fare better inside protected areas?

Several recent studies have revealed that protected area designation is linked to greater abundance and more positive population trends for UK birds, particularly those of higher conservation concern.

A BTO study led by Research Ecologist Dr Ailidh Barnes analysed data from two Bird Atlas projects and the Constant Effort Sites Scheme (part of the Bird Ringing Scheme), as well as the Breeding Bird Survey, and provides important new evidence that protected areas benefit birds: bird species occur more often and in higher numbers in protected areas, and are more likely to colonise and remain at sites with a greater extent of protected area coverage. These benefits were particularly beneficial to rare and declining species.

Uniquely, the use of ringing data enabled the BTO team to demonstrate that some species with higher abundance and positive abundance trends over time with a greater extent of protected areas also supported increased productivity and trends in productivity over time, respectively - (the number of young birds fledged per adult).

Protected areas support increased productivity, which is associated with positive trends in abundance.

Because the greatest benefit to birds was associated with SPAs designated specifically for birds, rather than SACs designated for habitats/biodiversity, this suggests that the most effective protected areas are those specifically designated and managed for the species of interest.

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Natura 2000 sites such as Holme Fen, Cambridgeshire, are associated with a higher abundance of birds than non-protected areas.

A second study led by the RSPB and including BTO’s Senior Research Ecologist Dr Samantha Franks explored how Breeding Bird Survey data changed over time in protected areas. These included Natura 2000 sites – Special Protection Areas (SPAs) and Special Areas of Conservation (SACs) – and Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs), which receive less legal protection for wildlife than SPAs and SACs. Because the Natura 2000 sites fall under a European Union directive, the study only examined data up to 2015, immediately prior to the UK’s departure from the EU.

The study also found positive correlations between Natura 2000 sites and the abundance of specialist bird species, and the abundance of bird species of higher conservation concern (those which were Red or Amber-listed in the most recent assessment of their conservation status prior to the study). SPAs and SACs were associated with greater benefits than SSSIs. This highlights the importance of protected areas, especially those with targeted protection, for maintaining biodiversity on a local and landscape scale.

Targeted protection and management give the biggest boost

It’s particularly important that we understand the conditions which provide the biggest benefit to species which are declining or rare in the UK.

Waders are among the species that have declined the most over the last 30 years, and are often the target of specific conservation management on protected sites. For example, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) has restored and managed lowland wet grassland nature reserves to benefit these species.

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Snipe are the focus of targeted conservation management in wet grassland nature reserves where they breed. This photograph shows a young chick. David Scott / BTO

The importance of this targeted management was highlighted by an RSPB-led study involving BTO’s Data Scientist Dr Dario Massimino, which investigated the impact of RSPB wet grassland reserves on wader population trends. It used Breeding Bird Survey data from unprotected sites to calculate a ‘counterfactual’ - a benchmark for what we would expect to have happened in the absence of conservation intervention.

For four key wader species (Lapwing, Redshank, Curlew and Snipe), population trends on reserves from 1994–2018 were consistently better than those off reserves. This indicates that the management of the RSPB reserves has had a significant positive impact on the target species.

Similarly, a second study led by Dr Samantha Franks found that policy and conservation management actions across Europe were most effective for waders breeding on wet grassland when targeted to them, particularly site protection and higher-tier agri-environment schemes. Both these measures were associated with greater abundance, productivity and more positive population trends of most species. However, the study concludes with a chilling warning: despite this positive news, wader populations at a national scale are still declining.

Despite the positive impact of policy and conservation management actions…wader populations at a national scale are still declining.

Why is this, when protected areas look to be effective? It is probably because the combined magnitude and geographical scale of protected areas are not enough to compensate for overall declines across the wider countryside. If this is the case, to halt or reverse declines we need a combination of effective additional measures across the countryside, such as agri-environment schemes, as well as to build on our current protected area network, which is why the ‘30x30’ target has received such interest.

Protected area networks are key: the case of the Burry Inlet Oystercatchers

It’s important to consider the ‘bigger picture’, and focus on more than just individual protected areas when examining the impacts they have on birds. BTO research has also revealed that a network of protected areas can give benefits above and beyond that of a single protected site.

A network of protected areas can give benefits above and beyond that of a single protected site.

BTO Cymru’s Research Ecologist Dr Katharine Bowgen led a study investigating the value of a protected area network for wintering Oystercatchers (which are Amber-listed in the UK) during a period of fluctuating cockle availability. Cockles are an important prey species for Oystercatchers and other wader species.

Burry Inlet in south Wales is an SPA designated for the many wading birds that occur there, and is also a site for commercial cockle harvesting. The inlet lies adjacent to the Three Rivers Estuary, which falls under the Carmarthen Bay SAC and, unlike the SPA, is subject to a cap on cockle harvesting because of the area’s protected status.

In 2004, there was a significant crash in the number of cockles in Burry Inlet, affecting both the cockle harvesting and the waders which rely on this shellfish for food during winter. Ringing data for this period show that Oystercatchers experienced increased mortality and decreased body condition, likely due to the reduction in their major food source.

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Around 350,000 Oystercatchers winter around the UK’s coast. This number has decreased by almost 25% between 1993–2018. Protected areas form key networks of habitat for this Amber-listed species. Tom Cadwallender / BTO

By analysing data from the Wetland Bird Survey, the study showed that Oystercatcher numbers decreased in Burry Inlet during the crash, as might be expected. However, there was a corresponding increase in Oystercatchers recorded in the neighbouring Three Rivers Estuary area, suggesting that Oystercatchers which would usually feed in the Burry Inlet over winter were moving to a nearby area with a more abundant food supply.

The study concluded that networks of protected areas can buffer fluctuations in environmental conditions, such as prey or shelter availability. This means that multiple protected habitats for the same bird population are important to give the maximum benefit to birds.

Looking to the future: protected areas and climate change

The impacts of climate change on birds are apparent, from the timing of biological events to species’ survival ability, distributions and population sizes.

In theory, we know that targeted conservation could help reduce the impact of climate change on birds. For example, it could reduce their exposure to conditions caused by climate change, or even increase their capacity to adapt to climatic changes.

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Many protected areas are upland sites, such as Beinn Eighe (Wester Ross, Scotland). These areas tend to support lower species diversity, but higher numbers of rare or specialist species which are particularly vulnerable to climate change.

But many protected areas were not established with climate change adaptation in mind. So is there any evidence that they play an important role in this field of conservation?

In 2022, BTO’s Dr Katharine Bowgen and Dr James Pearce Higgins led the first quantitative global assessment of biodiversity conservation interventions for climate change adaptation.

This study provides important new evidence that there is a lot that conservationists can do to help species respond to climate change. Whilst the greatest likelihood of success was associated with species-specific interventions, the establishment of protected areas, habitat management and restoration, also appeared beneficial in some circumstances.

Protected areas established without consideration of climate change still benefit species in terms of climate change adaptation.

The benefit of protected areas for individual species was lower compared to targeted species-specific interventions to address particular climate change impacts such as supplementary feeding, but this is likely due to a specificity/success trade-off: specific interventions are highly likely to confer benefit to the target species, whereas broader interventions such as site protection have the potential to benefit more species, but with a reduced likelihood of success for each individual species.

Encouragingly, the assessment revealed that protected areas established without consideration of climate change still benefit species in terms of climate change adaptation. This is particularly true for species which are moving or expanding their range in response to climate change, which are able to colonise sites in protected area networks such as Natura 2000.

Protected areas and policy: what next?

The research outlined in this case study makes it clear that protected areas confer vital benefits to all species, but particularly those which are of higher conservation concern. These benefits are likely to become even more important in a changing climate. However, many of these species are still declining, or are only present in very small numbers. In order for us to halt and reverse their decline, the UK’s birds need continued or increased protection.

Prior to Brexit, protected areas in the UK fell under a mix of domestic and European Union legislation. Since the UK left the EU, however, all sites fall under domestic legislation. This gives the UK an opportunity to review the policies and protections focused on these sites, and to decide how best to proceed in order to meet the biodiversity goals agreed upon at COP15 in 2022.

With extensive datasets and robust science, BTO is ideally placed to inform the prioritisation of new sites for protected area designation as part of the efforts to achieve the ‘30x30’ target. We are also working to understand how improving the condition of protected areas can boost bird populations in the UK.

By providing policy-makers with evidence about the UK’s birds, their conservation needs, and the role of protected areas in ensuring their populations thrive, we can have the highest impact for birds and for the natural world.

Publications

Conservation interventions can benefit species impacted by climate change. Bowgen, K.M., Kettel, E.F., Butchart, S.H.M., Carr, J.A., Foden, W.B., Magin, G., Morecroft, M.D., Smith, R.K., Stein, B.A., Sutherland, W.G., Thaxter, C.B. & Pearce-Higgins, J.W. (2022)
Benefits of protected area networks for breeding bird populations and communities. Sanderson, F.J., Wilson, J.D., Franks, S.E. & Buchanan, G.M. (2022)
Rare and declining bird species benefit most from designating protected areas for conservation in the UK. Barnes, A.E., Davies, J.G., Martay, B., Boersch-Supan, P. H., Harris, S.J., Noble, D.G., Pearce-Higgins, J.W. & Robinson, R.A. (2022)
A counterfactual approach to measure the impact of wet grassland conservation on UK breeding bird populations. Jellesmark, S., Ausden, M., Blackburn, T.M., Gregory, R.D., Hoffmann, M., Massimino, D., McRae, L. & Visconti, P. (2021)
Evaluating the effectiveness of conservation measures for European grassland‐breeding waders. Franks S.E., Roodbergen M., Teunissen W., Carrington Cotton, A., Pearce‐Higgins, J.W. (2018)
Resilient protected area network enables species adaptation that mitigates the impact of a crash in food supply. Bowgen, K.M., Wright, L.J., Calbrade, N.A., Coker, D., Dodd, S.G., Hainsworth, I., Howells, R.J., Hughes, D.S., Jenks, P., Murphy, M.D., Sanderson, W.G., Taylor, R.C. & Burton, N.H.K (2022)

Golden Plover. Liz Cutting / BTO

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What role do protected areas play in bird conservation? 2 April 2023

In December 2022, at COP 15, the UK committed to a new set of international biodiversity goals, along with 187 other nations from across the globe. These goals included the effective conservation and management of at least 30% of the world’s lands, inland waters, coastal areas and oceans by 2030 – the ‘30x30’ target. This has highlighted once more the assumed importance of protected areas for slowing and reversing biodiversity loss. But how effective are these areas for bird conservation?

No Breeding Bird SurveyBird Ringing SchemeNest Record SchemeWetland Bird Survey

Using species-habitat models to predict bird counts from urban development plans

VIOLA.ROSS-SMITH — Fri, 28 Apr 2023 09:46:00 +0000

The Cuckoo cohort of 2024 takes flight!

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Cooper, J.E.J., Plummer, K.E. & Siriwardena, G.M. Landscape and Urban Planning 10.1016/j.landurbplan.2022.104629 If urban environments are designed from the outset to be biodiversity-friendly, they can support resilient wildlife communities, improve the wellbeing of inhabitants, and reduce overall costs due to a reduced need for buying compensatory land. Urban planners might best design productive green infrastructure through predictive tools that output rapid, quantitative, and reliable wildlife statistics from digitized plans. Here, we demonstrate how species-habitat models could provide the foundation for such a tool. We took plans for nine housing developments across England and Wales and integrated them with high-resolution digital maps to derive the urban landscape measures used to parameterise previously developed species-habitat models. We produced predictions of abundance for 55 common bird species per development, which we summarised into bird trait groups and overall diversity. We compared predictions between planned developments and designs with alterations to greenspace, woodland, and housing configuration in five scenarios. We found that biodiversity predictions for actual plans were lower than at least one scenario per development, but that the scenario that achieved the highest species diversity varied between sites. This indicates that optimal solutions for bird diversity depend upon the biophysical context of each planned development. We believe that this framework could provide a cost-effective and data-driven approach to support green infrastructure and be of particular importance for urban planners in jurisdictions where such considerations are mandatory. The authors are grateful to the thousands of volunteers who contributed to the Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) datasets which were used as part of the modelling process and to Minna Ots, who digitised development maps. This project was funded by a partnership of the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC), BTO and UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, and the authors thank Niki Newton, Anna Robinson, Michael Pocock, Nick Isaac and Rob Robinson for their support. The BBS is funded by a partnership of BTO, JNCC and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

A niche-based approach for evaluating the mechanisms of community stability in butterfly communities across three countries

MIKETOMS — Wed, 22 Mar 2023 09:34:18 +0000

The Cuckoo cohort of 2024 takes flight!

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Evans, L.C., Melero, Y., Schmucki, S., Boersch-Supan, P.H., Brotons, L., Fontaine, C., Jiguet, F., Kuussaari, M., Massimino, D., Robinson, R.A., Roy, D.B., Schweiger, O., Settele, J., Stefanescu, C., van Turnhout, C.A.M. & Oliver, T.H. Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.16684 At large scales, the mechanisms underpinning community stability in natural populations may vary in importance due to changes in species composition, mean abundance, and species richness. Here we link species characteristics (niche positions) and community characteristics (richness and abundance) to evaluate the importance of stability mechanisms in 140 butterfly communities across three European countries and spanning five bioclimatic regions. We construct niche-based hierarchical structural Bayesian models to explain first differences in abundance, population stability, and species richness between the countries, and then explore how these factors directly and indirectly (via synchrony and population stability) impact community stability. Species richness was partially explained by the position of a site relative to the niches of the species pool, and species near the centre of their niche had higher average population stability. The differences in mean abundance, population stability, and species richness then influenced how much variation in community stability they explained across the countries. We found, using variance partitioning, that community stability in Finnish communities was most influenced by community abundance, whereas this was unimportant in Spain with species synchrony explaining most variation; the UK was somewhat intermediate with both factors explaining variation. Across all countries, the diversity-stability relationship was indirect with species richness decreasing synchrony which increased community stability, with no direct effects of species richness. Our results suggest that in natural communities, biogeographic variation in key drivers of stability, such as population abundance and species richness, lead to community stability being limited by different factors and that this can partially be explained due to the niche characteristics of the European butterfly assemblage. We thank the volunteers collecting butterfly data and the funders of the schemes for the obtaining the data required for this study. The UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme is organized and funded by Butterfly Conservation, the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, British Trust for Ornithology, and the Joint Nature Conservation Committee. The Catalan BMS is funded by the Catalan Government, the Barcelona Provincial Council and other local partners. The Catalan BMS also incorporates the Andorra BMS that is run by CENMA and funded by Govern d'Andorra. The Finnish BMS is organized and funded by the Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE) and the Finnish Ministry of Environment.