Decline in bird & insect numbers??

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RockerRocker Frets: 4947
I have noticed a serious decline in the numbers of birds and insects this year (compared to last year and years previous).

Birds:
Fewer swallows and housemartins.  A noticeable reduction in the numbers of wood pigeons, crows and starlings.  Numbers of traditional garden birds appear to be holding up, ie normal.  Numbers of green finches appears to be on the increase after the virus that decimated the numbers of the species a few years ago.

Insects:
Greatly reduced numbers and varieties of butterflies.  Numbers of wild bees are greatly down compared to last year

Anyone in the UK notice a similar pattern? 
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. [Albert Einstein]

Nil Satis Nisi Optimum

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Comments

  • Nope. Shit tons of insects and birds near me. Maybe they decided to move to the city?

    Bye!

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  • BridgehouseBridgehouse Frets: 24579
    I’ve seen more butterflies and dragonflies in our garden this year than I have for 5 years or so. 

    Less bees tho. A lot more wood pigeons (mostly mating in our trees!) and also saw my first kingfisher by the river next to us. 

    Last week I heard (and saw) a woodpecker in one of our willows which was the first time I’d seen one for a few years as well. 
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  • robertyroberty Frets: 10893

    Across the world, more than 40 per cent of insect species are declining and a third are endangered, the analysis found. The rate of extinction is eight times faster than that of mammals, birds and reptiles. The total mass of insects is falling by a precipitous 2.5 per cent a year, according to the best data available, suggesting they could vanish within a century.


    https://www.unenvironment.org/news-and-stories/story/insect-declines-are-stark-warning-humanity

    Insects are part of the food chain... so quite important really!
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  • RandallFlaggRandallFlagg Frets: 13929
    Yep, hardly a butterfly here in Norfolk, fewer bees and wasps are pretty much gone. Not seen a mayfly or dragon fly all summer. There are fewer pigeons as well but they tend to come in in winter along with the pheasants and deer, looking for food.

    The Housemartin's are back, I was watching them flitting around and twittering above the house and field over the back on Monday evening, feeding on airborne insects I guess. It was quite a happy hour.


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  • LastMantraLastMantra Frets: 3822
    I thought the plan was we would all be eating insects in the future? Now what?
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  • VimFuegoVimFuego Frets: 15476
    seen more song birds this year than ever, presumably this means lots of bugs to eat. I put this down to it being a largely livestock farming area, so much lower use of pesticides and lots of hedgerows. 

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  • JezWyndJezWynd Frets: 6021
    Seen very few butterflies this year, far fewer than last year. Sparrows have done well though, which is good to see. First time in years that I've seen a flock of them, nowhere near the size of the hedgerow flocks I used to see 40-50 years ago but a definite uptick.
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  • SassafrasSassafras Frets: 30273
    Fuckin cats kill all the birds round here.
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  • OctafishOctafish Frets: 1937
    Sassafras said:
    Fuckin cats kill all the birds round here.
    Well stop fuckin cats then!
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  • KeikoKeiko Frets: 962
    There was a long period of really bad weather this spring that has ruined the breeding season for a lot of birds Im sure.  We had a goldfinch nest completely destroyed by the wind and rain, it had eggs in it. Not sure if the baby blue tits fledged this year out of the nextbox or if they all died. I'll have a look in the next couple of weeks. One of the adults went missing and the other one seemed to struggle to keep up the feeding on its own.

    Green space is disappearing pretty fast too. Housing estates popping up everywhere. Even one of our local nature reserves is getting a road built right through the center of it.
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  • HAL9000HAL9000 Frets: 9551
    In the past we’ve had greenfinches, blue tits, long tail tits, great tits, nuthatches, etc at the feeders. This year we’ve had a handful of blue tits.
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  • tony99tony99 Frets: 7076
    How many insects were there last year?
    Bollocks you don't know Bono !!
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  • proggyproggy Frets: 5827
    A few weeks ago I saw some house sparrows in London, that is an extremely rare sight.
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  • VimFuegoVimFuego Frets: 15476
    we've a flock of house sparrows in a hawthorn outside our bedroom, the little cockneys always wake up at about 5 and start shrieking and fighting with each other and anyone else who passes. 

    I'm not locked in here with you, you are locked in here with me.

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  • BigLicks67BigLicks67 Frets: 766
    We have got 2 wood pigeons, 2 collared doves, 2 blackbirds, greenfinches and a family of sparrows living in the trees at the back of our garden. We also get visits from Goldfinch, Starlings  a Robin, Blue tits and a Heron and every blue moon a Sparrowhawk. Also every night at dusk a pipistrelle bat appears. On top of that there are 3 House Martin nests on our street. So things are pretty good this year. 
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  • KittyfriskKittyfrisk Frets: 18384
    I guess its probably a location thing?
    In N.E.England I have had more house sparrows this year than in many previous years. The place is jumping!
    The usual dunnocks, collared doves, wood pigeons, greenfinches, blue tits, coal tits, siskins,robins, starlings, blackbirds, thrushes, occasional ducks & sodding noisy jackdaws.

    Fewer of the usual butterflies; small tortoiseshell, red admiral & peacocks but loads of moths, except sadly no hummingbird hawkmoths this year at all.
    I reckon the prolonged cool wet winters of the last couple of years might have had an impact to the insects.
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  • scrumhalfscrumhalf Frets: 11262
    I've noticed far fewer flies this year. Maybe there's a decline in dog turds for them to sunbathe on.
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  • 57Deluxe57Deluxe Frets: 7329
    very few butterflies on my Buddleia this year...

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  • lasermonkeylasermonkey Frets: 1940
    Considering our garden is quite small, we get good numbers of birds visiting. It does depend on the time of year as to what shows up, but it's been consistently good over the past few years. That said, we almost never get chaffinches any more. Insect numbers aren't great in the garden, with the amount of moths down drastically, even from last year. I have recently become quite fascinated by moths and have ID'd just a handful of species, with just one or two examples. I'm hopefully borrowing a light trap soon so I can get a better idea of what's around.

    On a recent holiday in the Suffolk Coastal area, we stayed in a log cabin in the middle of a wildflower meadow, surrounded by hedgerows. I counted almost fifty different species of moth in the week we were there, including a couple of impressive poplar hawk moths, and that was without any specialist equipment. I took loads of pics.

    But that's a particularly good place to go and not necessarily representative of the country as a whole. Certainly, we have noticed far fewer bug splats on the windscreen on long journeys. That's actually a pretty good indicator, and it's widely reported that this is happening everywhere.

    I remember as a kid in the 70s seeing large tortoiseshell butterflies in some numbers. They're now extinct in the UK. I'm sure I'm seeing fewer and fewer butterflies, despite actively looking out for them. This year in the garden we've had holly blue, brimstone, small white, large white, peacock, red admiral, painted lady, gatekeeper, comma and orange-tip. No small torties so far this year. We have also had common blue damselflies, a banded demoiselle and what looked like an immature broad-bodied chaser dragonfly yesterday. As for moths, I've so far identified cinnabar, large yellow underwing (that one came in with the washing), rustic, common wainscot and what I'm sure was a scarlet tiger flying over the garden. Oh, and I found a large, winged Roesel's bush cricket last week, the winged ones being somewhat rare.

    What's depressing is the amount of apparently common birds on the RSPB's Red List. Part of the Red List's criteria is that the species' breeding population must have declined by at least 50% over the past 25 years. That list includes starlings, house sparrows, tree sparrows and song thrushes! When you look at the amount of habitat being lost in the south east due to new housing, it's hardly surprising.
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  • SnagsSnags Frets: 5326
    If anything we've got more birds in our garden  and Woody Woodpecker had been more then usual. Fewer dragonflies, but the pond is a disgrace at the moment.

    Insects, not a clue. Unless it's a wasp giving me shit, or ants getting in the house,  I try to ignore them. Although we do seem to have had more flies in than normal. Probably should wash more often.
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