The Beautiful British Songbird

‘Sussex without the wonderful sound of nightingales drifting over a darkening landscape is too dire to contemplate’

The nightingale is dear to my heart; it’s beautiful song fills the evening sky here at Woods Mill in late April and May enabling me to share my joy with many people who come on the Trust’s ‘Evening with Nightingales’ events and for those who come to listen for themselves.

Sussex is one of the last strongholds in England for the nightingale, the best of the British songbirds. There is a dreadful scenario looming that, with a decline of 91% in their population in the last 40 years (as per British Trust for Ornithology (BTO)), their wonderful song may disappear from our countryside altogether.

Nightingales are migratory birds, they spend the winter in West Africa but we are not sure where and in fact, we know very little about them or indeed how they get there. Thanks to modern technology BTO scientists have been able to fit a tiny geolocator to a nightingale which has been recovered and details download of its incredible journey. In fact 20 birds were fitted but only one has been recovered, enough though to give scientists a remarkable amount of insight that will help inform the conservation of this species in both its breeding grounds in Europe and wintering areas in Africa.

This particular individual was fitted with the device at its nesting site in Norfolk on the 2nd May. It departed on the 25th July having raised a family and confirmed the idea that adult nightingales leave the breeding site very early once the family has been raised. A few days later it had crossed the channel to Northern France. By mid-August it had traversed France and was located in the south and had crossed the Straits of Gibraltar at the end of the month and then spent about three weeks slowly making its way down through Morocco.

During October and November it seemed to be around the Western Sahara, eventually arriving at its wintering ground near the Senegal and Guinea-Bissau border.
Mid-February saw the bird set off for the return migration, but not long after the device failed. Amazingly though, the bird made it all the way back to Norfolk and what was even more astonishing was that the scientists caught the bird only 50 metres away from where it was trapped the previous year.  The device was still attached resulting in details of its incredible 3,000 mile journey to be downloaded.

From the information gathered it confirmed that the widely held belief that birds show a strong fidelity to their nesting sites. It also gave an insight to where birds might have lengthy stopovers on their long journey, places that may be vital for feeding and replenishing energy. Finally, we now know for sure where nightingales spend the winter. Electronic devices have been used successfully on larger birds such as ospreys for a few years now, but this is the first one to be fitted to a small songbird.  It has produced such comprehensive data it may revolutionise our knowledge about these migratory birds.

All this knowledge can help scientists devise conservation measures on an international scale and perhaps reverse the catastrophic decline nightingales have experienced in the last half century. Let us hope so: Sussex without the wonderful sound of nightingales drifting over a darkening landscape is too dire to contemplate.

Mike Russell,
Head of People and Wildlife at Sussex Wildlife Trust
www.sussexwt.org.uk

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