Cage & Aviary Birds Magazine No.5811 Reversal of Fortune Back Issue

OUR GOVERNMENT AND conservation
organisations are quick to take credit for
successful bird reintroduction schemes.
They’re a bit slower to give any credit to the
avicultural (broad sense) skills without which
these programmes would never get off the ground.
Take bird-of-prey reintroductions. White-tailed eagles
and red kites are doing so well that they feature in any
self-respecting local report on the tourist economy. Trippers
can enjoy kite-feeding jamborees in the West Country and
eagle-watching cruises off romantic Skye. And they’re a
buzz, these events, no question; they put many non-bird
people in touch with the avian world. However, the
meticulous rear-and-release operations that lie behind such
spectacles, in both cases featuring eggs or young taken
under licence on
the Continent,
receive little
publicity, though
Cage & Aviary Birds tries to make up for that. Kites, let’s not forget, were
starting to recover in their native Wales just as the first wave
of reintroductions took hold. White-tailed eagles have turned
the corner in Europe and could have been expected to
recolonise naturally – given time. Ditto cranes. All these are
spectacular, “headline” birds. I admit to a bias towards the
smaller, less showy candidates, of which the hawfinch (see
Terry Kelly’s article on page 11) is a prime example.
Hawfinches should be all over Britain. They’re not a
naturally peripheral southern species like the cirl bunting,
but a widespread, if uncommon, native of woodlands from
central Scotland to Cornwall and Kent. From much of this
range they have recently vanished; Terry, a lifelong birdman,
had never seen a wild hawfinch till this year. No-one fully
understands their decline, though it sounds as though the
(non-native) grey squirrel must take some blame. I agree
with Terry: it would be fantastic if aviculture could help to
restore this bird to its rightful place. Wouldn’t you love to
see a cherry-stone cracker or two on your bird table?