Marvelling at migratory birds – our work on an avian superhighway

As?Wild Isles ?demonstrated, our isles are a key location for migratory birds – from swirling flocks of Knot on our coasts to huge groups of Starlings in winter. With spring well underway, you might well have already spotted some of the migratory bird species that visit our shores in spring and summer – House Martins, Swallows, Swifts and Cuckoos to name just a few of the arrivals. In honour of World Migratory Bird Day (13 May) we’re celebrating the natural wonder of bird migration and the work that the RSPB and partners are doing to help migratory species both at home and further afield. Colleagues Will Bevan and Ian Barber take us into the world of bird migration.

The UK lies on a?vast migratory route ?- extending from the Arctic right down to southern Africa – a route known as the East Atlantic Flyway. The birds that visit our shores often make huge journeys across countries and continents and to help them, we must follow their lead and work across the flyway. Our international work complements the conservation work we are doing in the UK and ensures that we’re doing all we can to help migratory birds throughout their journeys along the flyway. In this blog, we’ll give you a flavour of our work on the flyway, starting at home.

But first, what is World Migratory Bird Day? World Migratory Bird Day is an awareness-raising campaign celebrating the amazing annual migration undertaken by many birds. Every year people around the world are united by a common theme and come together to organise events to observe World Migratory Bird Day. The celebrations take place on the second Saturday in May and again in October to coincide with the peak migration periods around the globe.

This year’s theme is ‘Water’ a vital component for all life on earth. During their life cycles, many migratory birds rely on aquatic habitats such as inland and coastal wetlands, rivers, lakes, streams, marshes, and ponds. These are all vital for feeding, drinking, or nesting, and are crucial places to rest and refuel during their long journeys.

To get a sense of the remarkable spectacles that migratory birds can bring – take a look at this video of Knot and other waders congregating at RSPB Snettisham on the Wash:

Helping Little Terns on the coast

While some migratory birds use the UK as a stopping off point before moving on, others stay to breed and raise chicks. At a few coastal sites around the country, dedicated teams of RSPB volunteers provide vital protection for one of these summer visitors - the Little Tern. Little Terns have suffered a long-term decline since the 1980s, but solutions are being implemented to try and recover this charismatic species.

Little Terns that summer in the UK spend the winter in West Africa, migrating north for the summer to make the most of the longer days and productive seas which are ideal for raising young. They begin arriving from mid-April, pairing up in dramatic aerial courtship displays before digging a scrape in the sand and shingle in which to lay their eggs. They may have undertaken this journey many times, with one individual clocking in at an incredible 25 years of age, having travelled around 200,000 miles in its lifetime!

Nesting in vulnerable spots just above the tideline, they face many threats including disturbance from dogs not on leads, recreational activities, egg thieves, high tides and stormy weather (made worse by climate change), as well as predation from ground and aerial predators.

There’s hope for Little Terns though – incredible teams of RSPB volunteers protect the colonies at sites around the coast, including in east Norfolk, north Suffolk and at Chesil Beach in Dorset – work which begins before the Little Terns arrive. Volunteers help put up fencing which will exclude predators and dogs and keep disturbance to a minimum, and are out every day, educating beach-goers and asking them to keep their dogs on leads and to?watch their step ?for vulnerable chicks and eggs.

By July the air is saturated with the chatter and shrieks of hundreds of Little Terns as they fly to and from the colony. In their slender yellow bills with tips dipped in black they clutch glistening fish freshly plucked from the sea, descending to the peeps of their fluffy, speckled chicks, which dive out of cover for the catch dangled before them. In a few weeks, the fledglings are ready to leave and start the journey south, stopping along the way to rest and feed.

2022 was a record-breaking number for Little Terns in east Norfolk, with 300 nests producing between 585 and 700 fledglings. Chesil Beach also fledged at least 60 chicks, with colony numbers on the rise since 2009. With enough time and given the space to thrive, and through the tireless efforts of those who protect them, hopefully this is a migratory bird on the road to recovery.

These two projects are part of the RSPB Species Volunteer Network (SVN), which supports volunteer teams working on vital species recovery projects across England and Northern Ireland, including some our other migratory breeding birds such as Corncrake, Turtle Dove, and Stone-curlew.

Heading north to Iceland

Iceland, with its dramatic rocky peaks and vast open landscapes of peat and wet grassland is an important breeding area for waders. It is on these open lowlands that waders and other waterbirds breed before many of them head south – either to spend the winter in the UK or to pass through as they journey further south.

But these breeding areas in Iceland are under threat primarily from climate change which is creating drier conditions more conducive for trees to grow, which in turn reduces the suitability of the habitat for breeding waders.

The RSPB has embarked on an exciting new area of work with Fuglavernd (BirdLife Iceland) alongside the Icelandic Government, universities and other conservation organisations to restore, better manage and where possible, protect important breeding sites for migratory waterbirds.

We’re helping Fuglavernd to establish an independent expert Committee advising the Icelandic Government on their Forestry Plan. Fuglavernd is also part of a hub of BirdLife partners including Norway, Sweden, Denmark, The Faeroes and Finland undertaking population estimates of migratory species that will help support funding proposals to support these threatened birds.

Our work in the north of the flyway is helping species such as Redshank, which breed in Iceland and then travel across the sea to spend their winters with us – by working with our flyway partners we can support these migratory wanderers year-round.

Heading down to West Africa

Senegal on the western-most coast of the African continent stands out as another important link in the chain of sites that connect countries up and down the East Atlantic Flyway.

The Senegal River originates in the highlands of Guinea and flows north-west acting as a border between Senegal and the neighbouring countries of Mali and Mauretania before reaching the Atlantic Ocean in a delta spawning vast wetlands just north of the city of Saint-Louis.

Wetlands of the Senegal River delta such as Djoudj Nature Reserve host hundreds of thousands of migratory waterbirds, which spend the winter there, many arriving from the UK and other parts of northern Europe. Notable among those wintering waterbirds is the Black-tailed Godwit, a species under threat (Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List) and a flagship species for the East Atlantic Flyway. Djoudj also hosts several species of terns including the elusive Little Tern – whose breeding grounds RSPB volunteers are doing so much to protect when they’re in the UK.

L'Association Nature Communauté Développement (NCD) is a young Senegalese NGO that recently became the BirdLife Partner in Senegal, following several years of capacity building by the RSPB. NCD’s network of local branches and local groups play an important role by monitoring wetlands along the flyway such as those around the Senegal River Delta. RSPB continues supporting NCD and its network of staff and volunteers to build their contribution to protect sites for the birds we share in common.

A chain of safe havens for migratory birds

There are many important sites providing rich feeding and breeding grounds for long-distance migratory birds along the whole flyway from the Arctic to the southern tip of Africa. These sites are important in their own right, but their real value is in the sum of their parts as a chain of safe havens supporting birds on route between their summer and winter destinations. Breaking any of the links in the chain could spell disaster for some species and render their journey impossible.

The?recent addition of wetlands along the east coast of England, from the Humber to the Thames, to the UK’s Tentative List of World Heritage sites ?demonstrates the importance of these habitats for nature and people. Our wetlands and other habitats are a vital resource for migratory birds and we must acknowledge their importance and protect them right along the flyway.

Look to the skies

Take a moment to soak in the sights and sounds of the migratory birds that visit our shores year after year and let’s celebrate World Migratory Bird Day and the importance of the habitats that support the amazing spectacle of bird migration. Think of the thousands of miles these birds have taken moving from one important site to the next, on their journey to our shores – spending just a few short weeks or months before setting off on the next leg of their journey.

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Find out more about our work on migratory birds:

??A view from the mudflats?

??Looking to the skies - the UK's importance on a bird superhighway?

??How countries are coming together to save coastal habitats, including for one of the world's rarest migratory birds

??Conserving birds on a continental scale – the Pan-African Ornithological Congress