by Chris Robinson
First published in newsletter 20.
I had excellent support to my telephone and other requests for help with this survey. Because it was a comparatively straightforward one, many of the people I approached were ones who had not done survey work before but nearly everybody I asked was keen to have a go and, better still, all but two of them completed their surveys in full!
The aim of the survey, which was a national one carried out by the BTO on behalf of DEFRA, was to resurvey all the wet meadow areas covered in the last survey carried out in 1982. Although the survey was relatively simple to do, there was potentially quite a lot or walking to be done and as several of the areas were extremely large (277 Ha being the largest!) I decided to split some of them into two or even three sections. This, of course, meant finding even more surveyors than the 28 areas on the Berkshire list, although a few areas were small enough and close enough to be done by one person. Nonetheless, an amazing 32 people took part in this survey including 14 who had never done any surveying before (or at least, not for me).
The method was quite straightforward - walk to within 100m of all points in your allocated area and locate and count any breeding wader, any duck (apart from Mallard) and two passerines; Yellow Wagtail and Meadow Pipit. Nearly all Berkshire areas were situated beside water courses such as the Rivers Kennet, Loddon, Thames, etc. so I was hopeful that despite the changes in agricultural practice that must have occurred in the last 20 years, most people might find at least one of the target species.
At the time of writing it is too soon to have any meaningful national results but BTO has told me that it would appear that Snipe numbers are very substantially down and Lapwing slightly down. On that simplistic evidence I can tell you that sadly, but perhaps predictably, Berkshire appears to have followed the national trend. Here's a comparison using data from the 24 areas in Berkshire which were surveyed in both 1982 and 2002 :-
| Total number of pairs recorded | Total number of areas recorded | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Species | 1982 | 2002 | 1982 | 2002 |
| Lapwing | 59 | 30 | 16 | 10 |
| Snipe | 10 | 0 | 4 | 0 |
| Redshank | 15 | 2 | 9 | 5 |
| Total number of pairs recorded | Total number of areas recorded | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Species | 1982 | 2002 | 1982 | 2002 |
| Yellow Wagtail | 19 | 22 | 7 | 6 |
| Meadow Pipit | 31 | 1 | 4 | 1 |
The one beacon appears to be Yellow Wagtail (let's hope it's not just a one-off annual surge) and possibly the decline in Redshank numbers may, in Berkshire at least, reflect their move to the gravel pits.