Redshank (Common Redshank)
Tringa totanus
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Distribution Britain 1,473 (-11.8%) Ireland 213 (-15.1%)
Numbers breeding: Britain 32,100 — Ireland 4,700 European status: 350,000 (11% in Britain and Ireland =4) British population trend: losing out in many areas (-72% CBC){-60%} How likely are you to record it? 127 squares (2.8%) Ranked 98 [88=] |
This nervous and noisy wader, the sentinel of the marshes, requires wet marshland (fresh or salt) to breed — almost colonial in favoured areas. About 1850 they declined but came back from 1870 for 70 years. The birds are vulnerable to cold winter weather and drainage. In Ireland breeding birds are found only in the Shannon Callows (severe recent declines), around Lough Erne and Lough Neagh with a handful in the machair of the North-west and some in Wexford and Wicklow. In England most are in the North-west, coastal marshes from Hampshire to the Humber and inland in Hampshire and parts of the Midlands. In the West the Somerset Levels and Severn Basin retain their birds but they are declining and very sparse in Wales. In Scotland they are absent from much of the Highlands but very dense on the machairs of the West. Further losses seem inevitable and even the hot spots on the machair may be at risk from mink and hedgehogs and on salt marshes from rising sea-levels and increased grazing pressures. Outlook pretty poor in many traditional areas.
From
The
State of the Nations Birds
Copyright © 2000 by Chris Mead