Abstract
Large declines in UK farmland bird populations have become a major conservation issue and the UK Government is committed to reversing these declines by 2020 (Public Service Agreement H13). Agri-environment (AE) schemes are the main single policy delivery mechanism for farmland bird recovery in England and Wales. The recent introduction of Environmental Stewardship in England encompassed both broad and shallow (e.g. Entry Level Scheme) and higher tier (e.g. Higher Level Scheme) provision within a single scheme. Whilst there is good evidence that the provision of suitable land management through AE schemes can maintain and enhance wild bird populations, there is still a lack of evidence concerning the amount of land that needs to be managed sympathetically and the combinations of AE options that need to be deployed at different spatial scales. This study aims to address these key policy questions using long-term data already collected from South Devon, England. In this area cirl buntings have been the subject of detailed monitoring and conservation effort delivered since the mid-1990s through Defra's Countryside Stewardship Scheme. Previous studies have shown cirl bunting numbers to have increased rapidly in repsonse to targetted AE provision of key feeding habitats. Recent bird surveys covering a wider suite of farmland birds now offer an opportunity to investigate the influence of AE provision (and specific land management options therein) on have four species of high current conservation concern (cirl bunting, yellowhammer, skylark & song thrush). The proposed analyses aim to determine the overall influence of recent AE provision on the abundance of these four priority bird species, and to identify particular AE options (or combinations of options) that have led to local increases in bird numbers. This information will have direct application to the refinement of AE deployment in Devon and other regions of the UK, and will therefore contribute to the delivery of the Government's PSA farmland bird target.
United Kingdom