An Unfunny Game

The release of non-native game birds and their impact upon the environment is in the news again this week. It is an issue mentioned several time on Another Bird Blog with the intention of alerting Joe Public to elements of the countryside that David Attenborough does not show. 

An estimated 40/50 million Common Pheasants and up to 10 million Red-legged Partridges are released into the countryside prior to the shooting season opening each 1 October.  

Red-legged Partridge 

Pheasant

The current pheasant and partridge shooting seasons draw to a close at the end of January 2020. The 2020 season opens on 1 October for Common Pheasant and 1 September for Red-legged Partridge. Releases of captive-bred birds occur prior to this, usually in July when trailer loads of pen-reared game-birds are transported to the shooting fields and released. Being pen-reared and regularly fed from leaving the egg the youngsters find most of their food from bins spaced at regular intervals throughout each shoot. 

Pen Rearing

 Off To The Shoot - Raptor Persecution Scotland

Feed Bin

The waste from transportation and feed bins provides rich pickings for predators of the crow family, mainly Carrion Crows. This easy availability of food throughout the winter months may have been a factor in the crows’ increased population since the 1960s, a trend associated with increases in nesting success/earlier laying. 

Carrion Crows take nestlings of small farmland birds and the eggs & chicks of waders, a fact of life easily witnessed by field workers. Some studies have found that crows along with their cousins the Magpie and the Raven have surprisingly little impact on the abundance of other bird species. I’m pretty certain those studies have not taken place in the Fylde Lancashire where it is not uncommon to see many hundreds of Carrion Crows on fields that are regularly shot and where lines of feed bins cross the landscape. 

A white Red-legged Partridge 

Carrion Crow 

Around 60% of game-birds released for shooting in the UK, an estimated 25/30 million birds, do not end up at their intended fate of being shot. This constitutes wastage, raising economic, environmental and ethical questions. There are four main reasons: predation, disease, starvation and dispersal into the wider countryside. Roadkill and agricultural operations contribute yet more often unquantifiable deaths. Early morning drives through areas of shoots will see many fresh corpses on carriageways where inexperienced and newly released game-birds meet the combustion engine. 

Pheasant Roadkill

The National Gamebag Census (NGC) records information provided by around 600 participating estates throughout Britain on shooting bags. There is no actual quantification of releasing as the NGC is a fraction of the actual shoots, many of which are on a small scale basis of individual and/or neighbouring farms. This I know because there are a number in this part of Lancashire and where gamekeepers are reluctant or evasive in revealing the number of game birds they “put down” (release). 

From "Birdwatch" magazine 21 January 2020. 

The non-profit legal entity Wild Justice revealed this week that it has sent a second letter to The Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) about the effect of releasing millions of non-native game-birds into the British countryside. 

Last July Wild Justice challenged DEFRA's failure to assess the ecological impact on sites of conservation interest of releasing approximately 50 million game-birds into the countryside. The government department took two months to respond, but agreed that the Secretary of State would undertake a review of the release of such birds on or near protected sites. 

Since July 2019 DEFRA has failed to act. With zero progress, Wild Justice pursued the challenge and wrote again urging DEFRA to act quickly. 

In the letter, Wild Justice's lawyers Leigh Day stated that, with DEFRA having recognised the problem in September 2019, "it would be unlawful for those releases to take place in 2020 unless the possibility of them having detrimental impacts on the sites in question had been properly considered and specifically ruled out ahead of time".  As such, "the Secretary of State needs to initiate those processes now". The lawyers added: "To hold off doing that would lead to illegality later and so be unlawful now." 

Mark Avery, a co-director of Wild Justice columnist, commented: "We started this legal challenge last July, DEFRA took two months to respond (mid-September) and now we are past mid-January, only six months from the time when game-bird releasing might start again. DEFRA needs to get moving. This legal letter is designed to give them a very firm shove." 

It’s good news that Wild Justice should tackle this subject but I question their limiting the campaign to “sites of conservation interest”. The release of non-native game-birds is a problem that impacts the whole of the countryside, all of which is of conservation interest given the catastrophic decline of so many birds of farm and field during the last 40 years.

Linking this post to Eileen's Blogspot and Anni's Birding.

It's Never Easy

There’s ringing news down the page but first some information not unconnected from the voluntary work that bird ringers undertake. 

According to a new study, if given funding and support from similar or future new schemes, British farmers have the potential to partially reverse the declines of Linnets and other farmland birds over the past 40 years - Birdguides.

“New research funded by Natural England and DEFRA used six years of survey data to track changes in the abundance of birds on farms. The study involved over 60 farms under Higher Level Stewardship (HLS) agreements in three English regions between 2008 and 2014, and revealed that 12 of the 17 priority farmland bird species showed a positive change in abundance, going against the 56 per cent decline in the number of farmland birds nationally since 1970. 

The Farmland Bird Index, one of our most important measures of biodiversity, increased by between 31 per cent and 97 per cent in different regions under HLS during 2008-2014. The average response of 17 priority bird species to HLS management was an increase in abundance of 163 per cent; bird numbers more than doubled. Results from farmers and land managers working on HLS agri-environment schemes were compared with farms in the UK’s wider farmed landscape. 

Results show farmers have the potential to deliver large and rapid population increases in a number of struggling farmland birds such as Skylark, Starling and Linnet if they are given the funding and support to manage their land in a wildlife-friendly way. This new information comes as the UK government is considering how to invest in a better agriculture system post-EU membership that works for nature, rewards farmers and benefits everyone around the country.” 

Skylark

“UK Government Environment Minister Michael Gove said: “Our farmers are the original ‘friends of the earth’ and these results clearly demonstrate the vital role they play in protecting our wildlife and boosting biodiversity. These results show that with the right management and more targeted support for farmers, we can reverse the decline in numbers of our birds.” 

Dr Will Peach, RSPB head of research delivery section said: “The UK has experienced a massive loss of farmland wildlife since the 1970s and DEFRA’s Wild Bird Indicators published only last month shows this loss has continued during the last five years. Our latest study shows that when farmers are supported to adopt wildlife-friendly approaches, then bird life will rapidly bounce back. 

Many farmers are doing great things for wildlife, and without their efforts the countryside would undoubtedly be in a much worse position. We have the knowledge and the tools to reverse farmland bird declines. What we need now is the political will to implement them more widely.”

Starling

Meanwhile, bird ringers have an important role to play in collecting data, even though our own catches of Linnets during the latter half of wet and windy 2017 have been poor at two ringing sites, both areas of farmland under Higher Level Stewardship (HLS) agreements. 

There was a slight frost this morning for a meet up at Gulf Lane, our first visit of 2018 to Project Linnet. We started the morning with a respectable total of 213 new Linnets from August to December 2017 and 423 new Linnets for year 2017. 

The winter has been mild with the number of frosty nights counted on one hand but I am buoyed up by the number of Linnets at ringing sites at Cockerham and Glasson Dock, anywhere between 150 and 350 throughout many visits.

Linnets

 

The problem at the moment is catching the Linnets, with today no exception. Despite a count of 160 birds this morning we managed to catch just two. There is still plenty of natural food around in the field of wild birdseed crop with the Linnets reluctant to use the food we leave as backup. But we don't give up easily so it’s back to the drawing board with our theories and proposals for next time.

 Linnet

Stay tuned, there’s more birding, ringing and pictures soon.

Linking today with Anni's Birding and Eileen's Blogspot.