Bustard Child

The RSPB-wallah responsible for dubbing Common Cranes “Herons on Steriods” has evidently decided that this simile is just too good to be used only once. Step forward then “Cranes on Steriods”, or to you and me: The Great Bustard.

It’s good to see another lost breeding bird being re-introduced, but at one hundred and thirty big ones per annum, it is a costly project that will surely lead to only a tiny and vulnerable breeding population.

This led me to try and search the internet for a list of birds that have become extinct as breeders in the United Kingdom and eventually I came up with this:

Barnacle Goose - c.1000 BC (as breeding bird, later recolonised)
Black-tailed Godwit - 1885 (as breeding bird)
Black Tern - 1885 (as breeding bird)
Capercaillie (reintroduced)
Common Crane - c.1620 (recolonised)
Cory's Shearwater - c.1000 BC (as breeding bird)
Dalmatian Pelican - c.1000 BC
Eurasian Eagle Owl - c.1000 BC (some doubt if present naturally since Ice Age)
Eskimo Curlew (never resident)
Eurasian Spoonbill - c.1620 (as breeding bird)
Great Auk - 1844
Great Bittern - 1886 (recolonised 1911)
Great Bustard - c.1650 (reintroduced 2004)
Kentish Plover - c.1940 (as breeding bird)
Little Bustard (as breeding bird)
Osprey (later recolonised)
Red-backed Shrike (as breeding bird)
Ruff - 1871 (as breeding bird)
White-tailed Eagle (reintroduced)
Wryneck (as breeding bird)

If I am honest, I thought the charge sheet would be a little longer given the relentless hunting, expanding population and all the environmental damage since the industrial revolution – there is still some hope for Homo sapiens yet!

Out of all the species above, it would be the Wryneck that I would most like to enjoy a renaissance in the United Kingdom. Their exquisite plumage elevates them to the very top of my list of favourite birds and I have been fortunate enough to enjoy superb close views of these birds in India.

Due to habitat loss, significant re-colonisation is unlikely, but it would be good for conservation charities to do more for Kate Humble’s (a little blonde job) little brown jobs too - especially birds in rapid decline such as Tree Sparrows, Corn Buntings and Twite, in addition to species with a high disposition towards steroid consumption.

Until later.