Farmland birds

Bird populations across the French countryside have fallen by a third over the last fifteen years, researchers have said. Dozens of species have seen their numbers decline, in some cases by two-thirds, the scientists said in a pair of studies – one national in scope and the other covering a large agricultural region in central France.

Ce déclin « catastrophique », d’un tiers en quinze ans, est largement dû aux pratiques agricoles, selon les études du CNRS et du Muséum d’histoire naturelle. Le printemps risque fort d’être silencieux. Le Muséum national d’histoire naturelle (MNHN) et le Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) publient, mardi 20 mars, les résultats principaux de deux réseaux de suivi des oiseaux sur le territoire français et évoquent un phénomène de « disparition massive », « proche de la catastrophe écologique ».

Neonicotinoid use has increased rapidly in recent years, with a global shift toward insecticide applications as seed coatings rather than aerial spraying. While the use of seed coatings can lessen the amount of overspray and drift, the near universal and prophylactic use of neonicotinoid seed coatings on major agricultural crops has led to widespread detections in the environment (pollen, soil, water, honey).

Nearly three million birds have disappeared from Denmark's farmlands in the space of four decades, according to a report. 15 of 22 species of bird connected to farmland habitats have shrunk in population size, while seven species have increased, reports the Fugle & Nature (Birds and Nature) magazine.

There has been a further decline in corncrake (Crex crex) numbers recorded during the 2017 breeding season, according to a National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) cited by nature conservation group Birdwatch Ireland. In the past three years, the number of breeding pairs has dropped dramatically from 230 in 2014 to 140 in 2017. Conservative estimates put the population at the beginning of the 20th century in the tens of thousands. However, this fell to an estimated 4,000 by the 1960s..

The widespread use of neonicotinoid insecticides in recent years has led to increasing environmental concern, including impacts to avian populations. In Texas and across their range, Northern bobwhite (Colinus virginianus) habitat frequently overlaps cultivated cropland protected by neonicotinoids.

The number of turtle dove (Streptopelia turtur) breeding pairs in the UK has dropped to a record low of 14,000, making an 84 percent drop since 1995."The turtle dove is the fastest declining bird in the country [England] and within ten years we could lose this icon of the British countryside completely,” said a spokesman for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. Turtle doves in the United Kingdom are found in just a few areas of Southern England and migrate during the winter toward Africa.

The 20th annual BirdTrends report highlights the rapid decline of the greenfinch, whose population has dropped by 59pc in the UK in just ten years. Bird experts say the decline is caused by a widespread and severe outbreak of a disease called trichomonosis, which first affected bird populations in 2006. The steepest long-term populations declines measured are for Turtle Dove, Tree Sparrow, Willow Tit, Grey Partridge and Nightingale, which have all declined by 90% or more since 1967, as, almost certainly, has Lesser Spotted Woodpecker.

Zum Verschwinden vieler Feldvögel hat die Landesregierung auf Anfrage der Grünen-Landtagsfraktion Details herausgegeben – und die Befunde sind alarmierend: So ist der Bestand an sogenannten Agrarvögeln seit 1995 in Brandenburg um ein Drittel zurückgegangen. Einige Vogelarten sind um mehr als die Hälfte dezimiert worden – etwa Kiebitz Vanellus vanellus (minus 77 Prozent) und Feldsperling Passer montanus (minus 31 Prozent).