Results from all of the breeding bird transect surveys have been processed and analysed up to the end of 2022. We are currently busy with 2023 data, updating reports, and digitising maps of territories for all of the years of surveys. We now have a big dataset covering many years, so the mapping in particular will take some time! 

But in the meantime, we have started looking at a few overall trends. To start with, we have worked out the "top ten" most common breeding species. We did this by simply adding up the total number of territories we have mapped for each species across all of the reserves that have breeding bird transects.

The current number one species looking at all the years we have survey data for (2006-2022) is the wren!

Wren hasn't always held that top spot though. A quick comparison between 2012 and 2022 shows that in ten years, there have been a few changes.

Wren, robin, chiffchaff, blackcap and song thrush have all moved up the list. Blackbird and willow warbler have held their spots. Blue tits and great tits have both moved down the list. Unfortunately chaffinch dropped from fourth place completely out of the top ten, but dunnock has moved up into eighth place. 

This is just a quick analysis and doesn't account for changes such as the number of surveys or differences in which sites were surveyed each year. However, it does reflect what we have seen at a lot of the individual sites over time.

Look out for future breeding bird survey updates to find out more about how we are using the data.

Many thanks to all of the current and former breeding bird survey volunteers and the office volunteers who process and analyse the survey data.