wild places | wild happenings | wild news
make a difference for our wild places

home | links | search the site
  all articles latest | past | articles by topics | search wildnews
wild news on wildsingapore
  BBC 16 Jan 05
Fewer wetland birds migrate to UK

 Fewer migrating ducks, geese and wading birds are wintering in Britain because more are staying closer to their Arctic breeding grounds due to global warming.

New studies by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) and the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust have revealed the fall. Teams patrol watersides in winter to count species and numbers of birds. Their work covers the Wash, Morecambe Bay, Norfolk coast, Solway Firth and the estuaries of the Humber, Thames, Dee and Mersey in the period 2001-04.

Ducks, geese and waders are attracted by the relatively warmer winter conditions in the Gulf Stream protected British Isles but global warming is blamed for the migrating birds preferring cooler northern and eastern waters.

Climate change

Britain is the winter home for about 10m wetland birds and the Wash sees populations of 350,000 while other sites and the estuaries have numbers of more than 100,000. However, heavy development of traditional sites in the south of England have seen loss of habitat which has caused the bird populations to move away.

Signs are growing that all is not well for a range of geese, ducks and wading birds. For species such as the Grey Plover and Dark-bellied Brent Goose, whose populations peaked in the early 1990s, after long periods of increase, numbers are now declining steadily.

But numbers of Little Egrets, Pink Footed Geese, Gadwall and Black-tailed Godwit are all reaching record levels.

Andy Musgrove, of the BTO, who is the wetland bird survey national co-ordinator, said: "Different species are changing in numbers and one possibility is redistribution due to climate change.

"Milder winters mean many species spend winter closer to their breeding grounds so a decreasing proportion of their populations migrates as far as the UK."
links
Related articles on global warming and global biodiversity
about the site | email ria
  News articles are reproduced for non-profit educational purposes.
 

website©ria tan 2003 www.wildsingapore.com