Sparrows still soaring in NI as coal tits fly into the Big Garden Birdwatch 2019 top 10

Guest blog by Claire Barnett, RSPB NI Conservation Team Leader


So the results are in and we can now say that house sparrows are still perched at number one as the most-spotted birds in Big Garden Birdwatch 2019 - both in Northern Ireland and across the UK.

Thanks to you, we had more than 7.5 million birds (including 1.2 million house sparrows) counted throughout the weekend at the end of January, with almost half a million people across the UK spending an hour watching the birds that visit their garden

Now in its 40^th year, the Big Garden Birdwatch is a chance for people of all ages to count the number of birds that visit their garden, helping us in the RSPB to build up a picture of how they are doing.

In Northern Ireland, where nearly 14,000 people took part in the survey, we had one new entry in the top 10, with coal tits (pictured, above) replacing collared doves at No.10 in the list. The top five stayed unchanged from last year, with house sparrows (below) followed by starlings, chaffinches, goldfinches and blue tits.


Long-tailed tits also dropped down from 15^th spot to 16^th and across the UK as a whole they decreased by more than 27%. Their numbers may have been affected by last year’s ‘Beast from the East’ as small birds are more susceptible to spells of cold weather.

While there has been an overall decline of 56% in house sparrow numbers reported by participants since the Big Garden Birdwatch (BGBW) began (1979 – 2019), in the most recent decade (2009-2019) numbers appear to have increased by 10%. So this gives us hope that at least a partial recovery may be happening.

Here I take look at six species on the BGBW results list:

HOUSE SPARROWS

It’s great to see that house sparrows are at number one. It’s amazing to find out that they’re in 71% of gardens in Northern Ireland. It means that people are doing something right in their gardens because sparrows aren’t doing as well in other regions (spotted on average in 63% of gardens across the UK). It really is lovely to see that they’re our number one bird.

COAL TITS

Coat tits (above) are the smallest member of the tit family, in winter they form flocks with other tits to look for food. They rely heavily on feeders, so they’ll be storing up the food that people are putting out. Obviously they’re reaping rewards as they’re now in the BGBW Top 10 in Northern Ireland.

ROBINS

They might be at number eight on the list but it’s great to see that they were recorded in nearly 90% of our gardens. They are very territorial and they hold their own spots every year, so people are probably seeing the same robin or pair of robins that they saw last year.

LONG-TAILED TITS

It’s really impressive that they’re in 16th position and that they’re in almost 18% of people’s gardens. There aren’t a huge number of these lovely wee birds out there as they move about in family flocks, so people are lucky to get to see them at all.


CHAFFINCHES AND GOLDFINCHES

Both real favourites with bird lovers, they love seeds and so people putting those into bird feeders has a big impact on these birds’ breeding success, you will often find them on the ground under feeders grabbing what they can. They are coming into our gardens in January looking for food to get themselves ready for the breeding season, so people shouldn’t underestimate how important it is to keep these birds well fed.

For a full round-up of all the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch results and to see which birds were visiting gardens where you live, visit www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch 

RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch 2019 results – Northern Ireland: