FIRECREST TOURS : Guided Birdwatching & Wildlife Days

Following the recent revelation in a review of systematic pesticides that neonicotinoids are  causing significant damage to invertebrate species and their populations  a new study, published in the science journal Nature  has revealed that the pesticides are also having a significant negative impact on bird species. Researchers in The Netherlands measured the effect of widespread use of a popular neonicotinoid, imidacloprid, discovering that when the chemical was highly concentrated in surface water supplies, local bird populations showed a significant decline. Birds most affected in the sites sampled included  Starling ,  Tree Sparrow  and  Swallow . These declines were able to be tied in with the introduction of imidacloprid in the country in the mid-1990s, even when allowing for the effects of changing agricultural methods such as the intensification of farming. Tree Sparrow  reproductivity relies on the abundance of insect life, on wh...

A second consecutive wet, cool and unsettled summer across Britain has wiped out large populations of bees, moths and butterflies, according to a new National Trust report. Common Blue Butterflies (Earthweek) - Butterflies have been very scarce across the United Kingdom this year, according to a National Trust report. It warns that the drop in the number of winged insects could cause birds and bats go to hungry for the remainder of this year. “Insect populations have been really very low. Then when they have got going, they’ve been hit by a spell of cool, windy weather... so our environment is just not bouncing with butterflies or anything else,”said Matthew Oates, a National Trust naturalist who worked on the report. It says that the dearth of airborne insects could cause martins, swifts, swallows and warblers to struggle to survive in the coming months. A delayed spring that started with the coldest March in 50 years across the U.K. caused frogs and toads to struggl...

Trophy exhibition on Facebook This Lebanese poacher proudly displays a shot White Stork A freshly-shot, still living Short-toed Eagle is proudly presented as a trophy. Armed men pose with freshly killed cranes and pelicans. Another hunter holding a dead Lesser Spotted Eagle grins into the camera lens. His hunting companion has neatly draped his bag for the day - hundreds of shot song birds - on a bedsheet. Two children, hardly eight years of age - inspect wide-eyed two dead Honey Buzzards that their father has brought back today from the hunt. Another still life shows nine freshly shot White Storks in the foreground with behind them the hunter, completely relaxed with a cigarette in one hand and the beak of one of the storks in the other. Such photos give an idea of the incredible damage that Lebanese poachers inflict on the European bird populations. There are several hundreds, perhaps thousands of such trophy pictures. Most are taken by the poachers themselves to show off to...