Bird Conservation Targeting Project

Making your BirdTrack Records Count for Conservation

The Bird Conservation Targeting Project is an exciting joint project organised in partnership between the British Trust for Ornithology, the Centre for Data and Recording, the Countryside Council for Wales, the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, Forestry Commission England, Forestry Commission Wales, Forestry Service, the Northern Ireland Environment Agency, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, and Scottish Natural Heritage.

The project collects bird records from many sources, including your BirdTrack records, county bird clubs and other national surveys. The results help to target valuable resources towards important bird sites which are identified by mapping the distributions of farmland and woodland birds of current conservation concern. In this way, we can all help to influence how millions of pounds in grant payments is distributed through agri-environment and woodland schemes.

You can really see the value of this project (and your sightings) by looking at the key species below. As we add more records, these maps will improve and give a better picture of the distribution of these particular species. The project now covers the whole of the UK and the full results are available here.

Woodlark As this species continues to spread, it will be interesting to see how this map changes over time. View map	Tree Pipit Note the hot-spots for this species and also how it may have disappeared from some areas in southeast England. View map
Ring Ouzel The restricted breeding distribution of this enigmatic species is nicely shown here, with birds restricted to certain habitats. View map	Marsh Tit Marsh Tits have been steadily declining, reflected by a more patchy distribution, particularly in the east of England. View map

To see some maps of results for your country / region, click on the links below. All species and regions are available here.