Saving Nature With Science

For his sabbatical last year, Principal Conservation Scientist Ron Summers carried out a survey of the remaining fragments of Caledonian pinewood in Highland Scotland. His aim was to observe management features that may be compromising the potential for the old pinewoods to expand, as well as noting the features that are affecting the integrity of the pinewoods.    

The Caledonian pinewoods of Highland Scotland represent…

A recently published paper has shown that upland woodlands are able to reduce flooding downstream, compared to other common upland land uses. In today’s guest blog, the authors share and discuss their findings.

Woodlands can reduce downstream flooding, but there are relatively few studies providing supporting evidence for these benefits. To address this issue, we measured soil properties and stream flow in upland…

A recent paper published in Nature Geoscience concludes that fire could be an important tool for increasing carbon storage in soils. This paper has been seized on by a UK grouse shooting industry seeking to justify continued vegetation burning in the uplands, including over peat soils. However, this overlooks crucial caveats that limit the applicability of this work to UK moorland. Here, Dr David Douglas, Principal Conservation…

The capercaillie is one of our most magnificent yet elusive species, found only in Scotland in the UK within their preferred pine woodland habitat. Substantial declines have been recorded since the mid-1970s, so a national survey provides updated estimates of the overall population, helping to guide further conservation action for this Red listed species. Today's guest blog by Siân Denney, RSPB Wildlife Advisor explains…

Today, we are publishing the 5th review of ‘Birds of Conservation Concern’, commonly referred to as BoCC, in the journal British Birds. This was a partnership project between the RSPB, British Trust for Ornithology, Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust and the government agencies - Joint Nature Conservation Committee, NatureScot, Natural England, Natural Resources Wales and Northern Ireland Environment Agency…

Wetlands on Orkney – a vital habitat for farmland breeding waders?

The publication of an RSPB-led study describes the importance of wetlands for breeding waders within Orkney’s farmed landscape. In today’s blog, Dr David Douglas, Principal Conservation Scientist, discusses the key findings.

The Orkney archipelago supports important wildlife populations, and this includes its high densities of breeding…

A new paper published today has shown that diseases affecting different UK tree species have a multiplying effect on the loss of associated biodiversity. In today’s blog, Paul Bellamy, Senior Conservation Scientist, discusses this new research by James Hutton Institute scientists and partners in the UK and Portugal.

In a study published in the latest issue of the Journal of Ecology, the research team reveal that…

After the 2020 Hope Farm summer monitoring season was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic, it has been great to get a full season of biological monitoring completed this summer. In this blog Derek Gruar, Senior Research Assistant, will present our findings from the core monitoring of breeding birds, butterflies and bumblebees on RSPB Hope Farm.

The first few surveys were conducted in unseasonably cold weather; overnight…

Today's blog by Fiona Burns, Senior Conservation Scientist, highlights the publication of an important paper on the EU and UK population of breeding birds.

Today we released a paper with colleagues in BirdLife International and the Czech Society for Ornithology estimating the change in the total number of breeding birds in the EU and UK between 1980 and 2017.  The stark results suggest that in my lifetime around 600…

Climate change presents one of the largest threats to birds and other wildlife. But as our understanding of the species struggling from climatic changes increases, so too does our toolkit for identifying solutions. As COP26 draws to a close, today's blog highlights the latest research from our team of scientists, working on understanding the impacts of climate change.

Upland species

Amongst the species most likely…

The nature and climate crises are inexorably interlinked. Changes in climate affect nature, while investing in nature can help people to both mitigate and adapt to climate change. That is why there has been a massive effort to make links between biodiversity COP 15 and climate COP 26. In today's blog, hear about the latest research contributing towards our understanding of climate change mitigation, from our team of…

Blog by Malcolm Burgess, Principal Conservation Scientist

An open access scientific paper has just published in Ibis, led by PhD student Fraser Bell at the University of Exeter, with scientists from the RSPB Centre for Conservation Science and the Swiss Ornithological Institute, and fieldworkers from PiedFly.Net. The paper reveals the full annual migration of British breeding Pied flycatchers for the first time.

The work…

The annual update of the UK’s Biodiversity Indicators was published today by Defra.  These are important metrics, reporting on the state of the UK’s biodiversity, the pressures it faces and the conservation action that is being undertaken in response. Today’s blog by Fiona Burns, Senior Conservation Scientist explains.

Our inter-related responses to the state of biodiversity and the pressure of climate…

Guest blog by Sophie Mott, Carbon Farming Project Manager and Georgie Bray, Hope Farm Manager

Why are we interested in Carbon at Hope farm?

Recently, hard to read science underlined the ever-closing gap in our opportunity to halt the increase in temperature beyond 1.5 degrees. A shocking statistic, and that is without the full understanding of what this may mean for nature, where we live, and our ability to farm. Given…

The charismatic, emblematic and highly distinctive—if not conventionally beautiful—northern bald ibis is a species that has faced significant challenges and declines. Fortunately it has also long been the focus of conservation concern and efforts. In today’s blog Chris Bowden, Coordinator of the AEWA Northern Bald Ibis International Working Group, explains how the population has been recovering and future prospects.…

Identifying areas around the world that can best contribute to the conservation of wild animals is a major challenge. Historically, this often required conducting extensive surveys in the field, but with the advent of miniature tracking technology we can now follow animals and allow them to indicate which areas they depend on the most. A new tool developed by BirdLife International and a network of international collaborators…

A scientific paper, just published in the Journal of Ornithology, written by scientists from the RSPB Centre for Conservation Science, suggests that the whinchat population in the UK uplands is not currently limited by the availability of apparently suitable breeding habitat. Conservation Scientists, Andrew Stanbury and Irena Tománková explain more.

Declining whinchat

Over the last century, breeding whinchat…

Today’s blog is by Conservation Scientist, Connie Tremlett, on her recent field work on the remote island of St Kilda tracking a tiny seabird

The Leach’s storm petrel is one of our smallest seabirds, around the size of a starling. They are beautiful birds – a sleek greyish black, with a domed forehead, a white rump and a forked tail. Unlike many of our other seabirds however, few people are privileged to have close…

Today's blog is by Conservation Scientist Tom Bradfer-Lawrence and Senior Conservation Scientist Rob Field. Tom led this work whilst working in the RSPB’s Centre for Conservation Science, but is now a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Stirling. 

The extent and severity of 2021’s extreme global weather events are manifestations of the warnings contained in the recent report from the Intergovernmental…

In the run up to the Convention on Biological Diversity, the UK Government has pledged to protect 30% of land by 2030. However, in a new study published today, RSPB scientists argue that as little as 5% may currently be effectively protected for nature.

Next year, governments of the world will come together to adopt the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework under the United Nations’ Convention on Biological Diversity…

A new study shows that a threatened migratory vulture faces a variety of threats along its 5000 km journey from Europe to Africa, with birds getting shot, poisoned and electrocuted in 13 countries across 3 continents. Large-scale collaboration is necessary to reduce threats in each country along the flyway to protect migratory birds. Steffen Oppel, Senior Conservation Scientist, explains.

Anybody who has ever witnessed…

Today’s blog is by Conservation Scientist, Rob Hughes, on the first, comprehensive report of breeding birds on the Shetland Islands

Shetland’s avifauna is largely known for its globally important seabird populations and rarer UK breeding species such as nationally important populations of red-necked phalaropes and whimbrels, however it’s commoner wader and passerine populations have received less attention.…

Guest blog by Alex Priestley, PhD student in snow science at the University of Edinburgh School of Geosciences as part of the NERC-funded E3 Doctoral Training Partnership.

Our uplands are home to species which are affected by snow cover in many ways, such as mountain hares’ or ptarmigans’ white colours in winter, and rare alpine plants living on ground that is snow-covered for months at a time. But Scottish snow cover…

A new study shows that supporting a declining population of a migratory vulture with captive-reared young birds every year could delay extinction, and thus afford conservationists more time to reduce lethal threats along a migratory flyway spanning three continents. RSPB Steffen Oppel, Senior Conservation Scientist, explains.

Since biblical times (remember Noah’s Ark?) people have entertained the concept that animals…

Poorly designed infrastructure development causes mortality of globally threatened birds along their migratory flyways – potentially causing population declines on breeding grounds in Europe and Asia. Steffen Oppel, Senior Conservation Scientist, explains.

‘Sustainable development’ is a laudable goal of the United Nations to improve livelihoods, but all too often the associated development projects are not actually…