Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Sightings of kites and buzzards no longer rare
Competition for food and habitat is seeing a return of larger birds of prey to the farm, notes Ro Collingborn
THE sight of a red kite, as it circles with the sun catching its shimmery red underside, initially brings a feeling of joy. The sight of 17 red kites systematically hunting across a field after a silage cut brings a feeling of uneasiness.
Until recently the only sure way to see a red kite was to travel to Christopher and Edith’s Gigrin Farm in Rhayader in Wales which has been a successful feeding area for red kites since 1992.
The red kite is a protected species under the 1981 Wildlife and Countryside Bill. Once widespread – in medieval times kites were welcomed as street cleaners in the city of London – they fell out of favour in the 16th century and were regarded as vermin with a bounty on their heads.
By the end of the last century numbers were at a very low point after 300 years of persecution. Legal protection meant that numbers began to expand, and the kites we see now would have expanded from the Chilterns where there were estimated to be 4,000 breeding pairs by 2017.
When I first moved to Wiltshire, the dominant birds of prey were the kestrel, sparrow hawk and various owls.
Now larger predators have taken control of our skies. With a five-foot wingspan, the red kite is the largest, followed by the buzzard and raven, both with wingspans of four feet. The largest bird of prey is the whitetailed eagle, but we’re not expecting to see any of these. We never saw buzzards, but gradually over the last 20 years, there were more sightings, and until recently these were increasing year on year.
Previously buzzards, also a protected species, had been affected by the use of organophosphates and viral haemorrhagic disease in rabbits which reduced their food supply. In the five years to 2016 there was a 50% increase in numbers, though this appears to be slowing. Now we feel we are seeing fewer, as numbers of kites expand.
It’s only recently that we’ve started seeing ravens on the farm. The first pair came from Somerset in 1992 and it was a deliberate re-introduction. In north Wiltshire (and the Tower of London), these are an iconic species. Hence the names Ravenshurst and Ravensroost in the Braydon Forest. My thoughts that smaller birds of prey such as kestrels and sparrow hawks are becoming rarer since the expansion of larger winged predators are observational, rather than scientific.
On our own farm, little has changed over the centuries. It’s always been a dairy farm, with the same ponds and hedges. We did lose our mature elms but these were replaced by a programme of planting some 1,500 trees in the 1970s and ’80s. For a species to proliferate and succeed, habitat, food supply and protection from predator attack are all important.
Buzzards, kites, ravens and kestrels
share a common food supply – rodents such as voles shrews and mice, rabbits, birds and invertebrates and carrion. Kestrels’ favourite food are voles. Vole numbers are said to be stable but there is increasing competition as larger birds join the hunt.
In the US, there has been a massive decline in kestrel numbers, though the cause has yet to be identified. Here kestrels are on the amber list and numbers are said to be stable, though showing a moderate decline.
Now a rarity, the sight of a hovering kestrel, patiently waiting to strike, used to be common. It was one I often saw looking out of the bedroom window. Now we have a
buzzard that comes for its earlymorning worms, in the field by the house, together with one or two kites circling in the sky. Are these things related and is the increased competition for food and habitat having an adverse effect on kestrel numbers?
On the farm this week a farming friend from South Wales called in to collect a bull he’d bought after seeing a video online. While he was here I showed him the calves including a lovely black five-week-old half-Friesian pedigree calf we were keeping for breeding. His eyes lit up and he had to have it, immediately accepting my price.
After he left I confided in Joe, my husband, that I wasn’t sure I had done the right thing. Joe reassured
me that although it was one of the best-looking bull calves we’d ever bred and came from a long line of VGs and Excellents: “You sell the best and it sells the rest. Every friend of Clive’s who visits his farm will be shown Little Joe as Clive has nicknamed him ‘Brinkworth Brilliant’ and it will help make our reputation in South Wales.” Clive also commented that Little Joe is a real character – just like his owner.
Ro Collingbourn is a Wiltshire dairy farmer and has been dairy chairman of the Women’s Food and Farming Union, on the Milk Development Council, the Veterinary Products Committee, the RSPCA Council and a Wiltshire Wildlife Trust Director.