View From The Shed by Volunteer Shaun - Red Light Spells Danger

RED LIGHT SPELLS DANGER

The RSPB made the national headline news recently. In case you missed it, the sad announcement was that five seabird species have been added to the ‘Red List’. I’ve talked about this ‘Red List’ in previous blogs, but I’ve never explained what it actually is, so…

The “Birds Of Conservation Concern” list is a joint effort, drawn up by a combination of nature charities and government bodies (including the RSPB) approximately every six years. It is a well respected and widely recognised report on the state of our birdlife which aims to show which birds are most endangered and to what degree. It uses the ‘traffic light’ system of red, amber and green status to show the different levels of conservation threat. Those of most concern are placed on the ‘Red’ list.

In addition to this there is a ‘Black List’ which reports those species that used to breed in Britain but no longer do. You might find these in old guide books as being British breeding birds, but birds like Golden Oriole, Serin, Wryneck and others are falling close to extinction in our green and pleasant land. Obviously we’d like to avoid adding any other species to this Black List and maybe even reverse these losses if we can. But I’m sure you’ll agree that the fact that adding five new birds to the Red List is a major cause for concern. 

The five in question are Great Skua, Leach’s Storm-Petrel, Common Gull, Great Black-backed Gull and Arctic Tern. Although you’d be hard pushed to see those first two here at Old Moor, the others do sometimes turn up in the Dearne Valley. I’ve seen all three here this year. I’d really like to be able to in future years too.

RSPB global conservation director Katie-Jo Luxton said, "As an island nation, it is perhaps not surprising that we are globally important for seabird populations. But what has really shocked us is the sheer number of our seabird species now on the red list."

Of the 26 seabirds that currently breed around our coastline, ten are now on this red list. As well as the five newcomers, Roseate Tern, Herring Gull, Kittiwake, Arctic Squake and the gorgeous little Puffin are already there. They all require urgent protection or, at the rate they are declining, future generations may not see any of them.

And the stark numbers are where it gets truly scary. 62% of UK seabird species are in critical decline. For example, kittiwakes and common gulls are down nearly 50% and puffin numbers have fallen by a quarter.

Looking at the 235 birds most regularly seen in the UK, 73 are now on the red list. Put simply, that means that almost one in three of all our species has suffered an alarming population loss.

And it’s not just the headline birds that are missing from our airscapes. Yes, Hen Harrier, Lesser-Spotted Woodpecker and Woodlark are on the Red List. The Turtle Dove population has fallen 98% since 1970 and there are no Golden Eagles at all left in England. These are the kind of birds that I’d expect to be listed.

But so are Starling, Song Thrush and House Sparrow, all of which I, in my ignorance, still think of as common garden birds. Just because a bird is still seen in relatively large numbers doesn’t mean that population isn’t declining horribly. There may still be almost two million breeding pairs of Starlings on our shores but that’s less than half of the population of just thirty years ago. Nature is in crisis.

Why? Climate change, overfishing, offshore wind farms, drastic changes in farming practices over recent generations - all these man-made problems are affecting our birds more than ever before. Add to that the ongoing devastation of avian influenza and the situation looks dire if we choose not to intervene. 

We have to act on this matter, and this is one reason why your membership of the RSPB and other conservation charities is so important. If just a handful of people were concerned about these things then they could easily be dismissed as being cranks, the lunatic fringe. But the current RSPB membership stands at nearly one and a quarter million. We thank you all for your financial support, especially in these current times of economic hardship, but also for adding your voice to our campaigns. 

There have been a lot of numbers in this blog and I appreciate that a lot of it has been doom and gloom. But you only have to look at the RSPB’s logo (on this page and on the warm clothing that they provide me with) to see what can be done with hard work, a little funding and a lot of determination.

The Avocet had been extinct in Britain for around 150 years until in 1977 a brave couple bred in Norfolk. Since then numbers have continued to rise until now we have around 2,000 breeding pairs with over four times that number choosing to spend their winters here. Whilst by no means a common bird, they have become established enough to have been taken off the Red List and moved down to Amber status. We still need to keep an eye on them but they’re no longer classed as being ‘of most concern’.

And we’ve recently seen another victory. After decades of pressure from the RSPB and others, our government has banned industrial sand eel fishing in the North Sea. These tiny creatures are the main food for Puffins and other birds, so their overfishing has added massively to those birds’ problems. The government has reacted to the sheer number of our members. That’s you, adding your voice to ours. Thank you. It’s still not over though. The EU Commission, under pressure from some of its member states, is hoping to overturn this decision. Again, we find ourselves asking politicians to do the right thing. The fight continues. 

We can change things. We can save species. We must.