New research from BTO implicates rising temperatures in the steep decline of the Willow Warbler, one of the UK’s most tuneful harbingers of spring. The study, published in the journal IBIS, shows that Willow Warblers are doing better in Scotland, where temperatures are cooler. Evidence is building to suggest the population in southern Britain is a casualty of recent anthropogenic climate change.
Wading birds in the UK have shown severe declines over the last 25 years, with many of them still struggling, according to a new report.
Proposed as the most urgent conservation priority in the UK as a result of a decline in its breeding population, numbers of this iconic bird are also falling in the winter, despite an influx of continental birds. Latest research from the British Trust for Ornithology investigates the likely causes and asks where conservation efforts should...
Despite being reasonably common, widespread, and easily identifiable from its vocal behaviour, we know surprisingly little about the changing fortunes of the UK’s breeding Tawny Owl population. There is evidence for an ongoing but shallow long-term decline in the population since the mid-1980s, but this evidence comes from studies that involve daytime surveys by volunteers....