Defra produces a very interesting little booklet entitled 'UK Biodiversity Indicators in Your Pocket' and the 2009 version is out.
It's certainly not all bad news - do have a look yourself to see - but it doesn't paint a great picture either.
One of the indicators refers to farmland birds and, as we know, there has been a big decline in the overall index since 1970. This has been driven by tumbling numbers of species such as turtle dove, corn bunting, grey partridge, yellow wagtail and skylark. The index is meant to be a measure of the overall ecological health of the farmland environment - if birds are declining what does that mean for wildlife as a whole? The farmland bird index was launched back in 1999 (but the data go back much further) as a 'Quality of Life' indicator and we haven't made progress since then in terms of more farmland birds in the countryside. If I could go back to the countruyside of the 1970s I would hear many more skylarks and see many more turtle doves than I do these days. It is a quality of life issue - nature is steadily being lost from our lives.
As I say - it's not all bad - some bird species are doing well and that is to be celebrated. But the fact that so many once-common birds are now quite difficult to see in many parts of the country (and that certainly includes turtle dove and corn bunting in my part of Northamptonshire, but yellow wagtail, tree sparrow and grey partridge elsewhere) does reduce the quality of my life.
It's not all bad - but it's not all birds either! Indicator 13 (unlucky for some!) is a measure of ecosystem integrity in the North Sea - what proportion of fish are big (over 40cm)? The index has plummetted over the last 25 years - presumably largely because of over-fishing. We are seriously overexploiting the marine environment to the extent that you have to worry about whether it will be able to recover even if we see sense and dramatically ease off on fishing pressure.
And then there are non-native species such as grey squirrel, American signal crayfish and mitten crabs. There is an index which covers such species and in freshwater, marine and terretrial habitats (so, everywhere!) the index is on the rise - meaning that there are more non-native species covering a wider geographic area than before. Many of these non-native species are benign, to people and other wildlife, but a significant number cause real economic and conservation problems. It's not their fault - we brought them here!
All of the indicators I have mentioned (and there are others) are heading in the wrong direction. They paint a picture of our countryside and seas becoming more homogeneous and less diverse. Habitat specialists decline and the generalists do well, as do a range of non-native, accidentally introduced species.
It doesn't have to be like this. And the RSPB in our conservation work from nature reserves to marine policy and from working with farmers to fighting damaging developments is trying, and often succeeding, to get a better deal for birds and the rest of the natural world.
Well Mark it is a massive problem for sure as a retired farmer I can tell you farmers are under tremendous financial pressure just look how many dairy farmers give up each year,please do you may be surprised,it certainly cannot carry on.I Have thought for a long time that one of the biggest problems is that autumn sown crops are more profitable than spring sown crops and so there are no stubble's for the birds to get a certain amount of food from in winter and of course all harvesting machinery is now much more efficient.I think the RSPB ought to make a big effort to advise farmers if the RSPB knows the answers because I think a lot of them would see if they could help wildlife,after all they live closer than anybody else and lots of them enjoy birds.Would love to see Red Squirrels colonise the country so it means all Grey's have to go,they shouldn't be here anyway and they certainly damage bird populations.
Sooty - always nice to see your comments. Have a look at our website - there is a link in the blog above - and you can find out about the work that the RSPB does with farmers. There's loads of it! And we have great relationships with many farmers who are doing great things for wildlife on their farms. Much of the stone curllew and corncrake recoveries at either end of the UK have been achieved through working very closely with farmers and crofters. I think the frustrating thing is that not all farmers are keen on wildlife and not all farmers do as much as they could - even though the wildlife benefits would be large and the costs can often be covered by the taxpayer through agri-environment funding. We much appreciate the work that the best farmers do - and that's why we have the NAture of Farming Award mentioned in today's blog - I hope that you have voted!