The Head of Conservation for BirdLife Europe & Central Asia explains how intensive agriculture has made farmland birds one of the most threatened bird groups in Europe. Once upon a time, they were all around us – sights and sounds as familiar as the dusky skies their flocks danced in or the wind whistling through […]
Tag: Turtle Dove
It’s a Great Hobby
Pun fully intended! A drive down to Dunge this morning at stupid o’clock gave Jim and I the chance to dip the “red male” Rosefinch reported yesterday but as the handful of readers of this blog will know, Dunge always delivers! A splendid Hobby sat up on a shed at the road side and allowed […]
Great Reed Warbler at Paxton
A 60 mile drive after work this evening delivered another lifer in the form of the Great Reed Warbler at Paxton. The bird could be heard calling above the Nightingales on arrival and was quickly found sitting up in the distant reed bed. The song was loud and distinctive and the sight of the huge […]
POLL: Should there be a moratorium on turtle dove hunting in Malta?
Malta should consider a temporary ban on the shooting of turtle doves which are being driven to extinction by hunting and other pressures, the EU’s environment chief has said. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) put turtledoves on its Red List of species threatened with extinction for the first time last October. […]
Puffins and turtle doves now as endangered as African Elephant
Puffins and turtle doves are now as endangered as the African Elephant and have been added to a list of animals most at risk of extinction. The much loved British birds have seen numbers plummet in recent years because of harsh winters, and are now under greater threat than even creatures like the humpback whale. […]
A third of Europe’s birds under threat, says most comprehensive study yet
One in three European birds is endangered, according to a leaked version of the most comprehensive study of Europe’s wildlife and natural habitats ever produced. The EU State of Nature report, seen by the Guardian, paints a picture of dramatic decline among once common avian species such as the skylark and turtle dove mainly as […]
POLL: Should spring hunting on Malta be stopped?
Fiona Burrows is the kind of activist that hunters in Malta love to hate. The Nottingham 30-year-old has been threatened, cursed at, and pushed around while doing the job she says she lives for: stealthily filming the illegal hunting of protected migratory birds and reporting perpetrators to the police. Burrows takes precautions – she always […]
Malta approves public referendum of bird hunt that kills over 15,000
Malta’s Constitutional Court has upheld a public referendum to decide the fate of the country’s controversial spring bird hunt, which kills over ten thousand migrating birds every year. The Constitutional Court threw out objections by Malta’s powerful hunting lobby, and instead sided with the 11 conservation groups who organized the referendum, known as the Coalition […]