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| Nightingale - a short-lived species |
NIGHTINGALE expert Graham Hopwood was in good form
when he gave a talk on this iconic bird to a meeting of the Grimsby
and Cleethorpes branch of the RSPB.
He started his presentation by suggesting that the 60 or so attendees at the Corpus
Christi church hall on Grimsby
Road might like to close their eyes
during the recording he played of a bird in full voice.
He apologised that the volume - via a laptop computer
- was not louder, joking that he should have brought with him a
ghetto blaster!
Midway between the size of blackbirds and robins (to which they are
related), nightingales are summer visitors from Ghana and
other parts of West Africa,
reaching England in
April.
Males singfrom the time of their arrival until
mid-June.
Alas, not only has their specialied habitat of really dense woodland scrub almost
disappeared in Lincolnshire but the
south of the county is at the northern edge of their breeding range
(though it is conceivable this may expand through climate change).
According to Graham, the nightingale population of England (it is
not found or heard in Scotland or Wales)
has declined by as much as 90 per cent since 1960, making it a very rare bird,
particularly outside certain favoured parts of South
Suffolk, Kent and Surrey.
The 1980 Lincolnshire Bird Report, records some 100 singing males in Lincolnshire, but,
by 2012, that figure had plummeted to 34 at most.
There is now only a single place in Lincolnshire where
three or four pairs nest - Whisby Nature Reserve, on the outskirts of Lincoln, where
Graham is assistant warden, employed by the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust.
Since taking up the appointment 11 years ago, he has been
diligently tracking the specific territories of Whisby's singing
nightingales, monitoring their numbers and doing everything possible to
oversee the creation of ideal nesting habitat - notably by replacing sycamore
trees with thickets of really dense blackthorn and hawthorn interspersed
with wild rose, bramble and nettles.
Despite his best efforts, there is no guarantee that the reserve's
nightingales have a long-term future. The population may not be
sufficiently large to sustain itself, and the gene pool is unlikely to be
enriched because there is no other known breeding presence of the species
within 40 miles.
The nightingale is also a relatively short-lived bird
- the average lifespan being no more than three years.
Graham revealed that one of his biggest bugbears at
Whisby was the irresponsible behaviour of a surprisingly
large number of dog owners who disregard notices asking them to keep
their pets on leads.
"I like dogs,"he said. "But the attitude of some of their
owners makes my blood boil.
"I plead with dog owners but many take not the
slightest bit of notice. They say their dogs would never harm wildlife.
"The fact is that an out-of-control dog -
spaniels tends to be the worst - can prompt a hen nightingale to leave her
nest. And a vacated nest is one whose eggs are liable to fall victim to a
predator."
In theory, nightingale friendly-habitat could be
created in other Lincolnshire nature
reserves or country parks, but such an initiative would probably be
futile - there are simply too few nightingales, and the disturbance they would
face would be colossal.
Happily, the species is common
in Mediterranean Europe where the birds are generally more
conspicuous and less demanding in their habitat requirements than their English
counterparts.
Bizarrely, those nightingales that come to our shores
seem to take on the characteristics of English people - they become retiring,
reserved and less extrovert than their Mediterranean
counterparts!
Photo: Carlos Delgadio, via Wikipedia
Photo: Carlos Delgadio, via Wikipedia
