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Bracknell's threatened birds declining due to snow falls
July 14, 2009
Numbers of a threatened species of bird native to some of Bracknell Forest’s nature reserves have dropped following heavy snowfalls in the winter.
Conservationists are warning that numbers of Dartford warblers could have fallen by 80 or 90 per cent.
Dartford warblers are on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s ‘near threatened’ list, one step up from species facing extinction, but numbers are relatively high on the Thames Basin Heaths.
Their “near threatened” status has put a block on development in their habitat across the heaths special protection area, 1,100 hectares of which is in the borough.
Last month the Government announced it would not allow an appeal from a developer wanting to build almost 1,000 houses near Crowthorne because of the impact it could have on Wildmoor Heath and the rare birds.
On the heath, off Sandhurst Road, between Crowthorne and Sandhurst, Dartford warblers had been becoming more common,
But experts say the snowfalls in the winter could have killed many birds as they make their nests in low bushes like gorse.
Sam Dawes, conservation manager in the RSPB’s South East region, said: “The impact of this winter’s snow shows what a fine balance there is between success and failure for these birds.
“Dartford warblers had been doing well in recent years due to milder winters and better protection of the sites.”
Exactly how badly the birds have been hit this year will be clear in the autumn when the RSPB carries out surveys of breeding birds.
But early counts suggest the news will not be good.
The restoration of heathland, the warbler’s natural habitat, has seen numbers go up from just 11 breeding pairs in the UK following the harsh winter of 1963, to around 3,200 pairs at the last count.
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