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BTO Blueline
SAND MARTIN
Riparia riparia
Sand Martin © Tommy Holden
 

• Population
  changes

• Productivity
  trends

• Additional
  information
Conservation listings
Europe: SPEC category 3 (depleted)
UK: amber (European status)
Long-term trend
UK: fluctuating, with no long-term trend
UK population size
85,000–270,000 nests in 1990 (1988–91 Atlas: APEP06); 66,300–211,000 pairs in 2000 (updated using WBS trend: BiE04)
Status summary
This species is unusually difficult to monitor, because active and inactive nest holes are difficult to distinguish, and because whole colonies frequently disperse or shift to new locations as suitable sand cliffs are created and destroyed. WBS counts, which are of apparently occupied nest holes along riverbanks, suggest a stable or shallowly increasing population, with wide fluctuations, although the ongoing decrease since the late 1990s has been steep enough to raise BTO alerts. BBS counts, which are of birds seen, show clearly that large year-to-year changes occur, but do not yet reveal a clear long-term trend. Nest record samples are small, but indicate that nest success has improved enormously since the 1960s, and that clutch size has also increased. Rainfall in the species' trans-Saharan wintering grounds prior to the birds' arrival promotes annual survival and thus abundance in the following breeding season (Szép 1995). Annual survival rates from RAS sites in the UK for 1990–2004 were correlated positively with minimum monthly rainfall during the wet season in West Africa (Robinson et al. 2008). More recently, it has been discovered that summer rainfall on the breeding grounds has a negative influence on survival rates through the following winter (Cowley & Siriwardena 2005).
 

Population changes
WBS UK graph
 
Table of population changes for Sand Martin

Source Period
(yrs)		 Years Plots
(n)		 Change
(%)		 Lower
limit		 Upper
limit		 Alert Comment
WBS waterways 28 1978-2006 19 -2 -39 55   Small sample
  25 1981-2006 20 -6 -42 76    
  10 1996-2006 22 -44 -59 -25 >25  
  5 2001-2006 18 -16 -27 4   Small sample
BBS UK 11 1995-2006 114 21 -36 122    
  10 1996-2006 117 16 -30 96    
  5 2001-2006 124 30 2 66    
BBS England 11 1995-2006 76 20 -19 53    
  10 1996-2006 77 10 -22 32    
  5 2001-2006 82 12 -9 36    

BBS acknowledgement
 
BBS UK graph
BBS England graph
 

Productivity trends
Table of productivity changes for Sand Martin

Variable Period
(yrs)		 Years Mean
annual
sample		 Trend Modelled
in first year		 Modelled
in 2006		 Change Comment
Clutch size 38 1968-2006 32 Curvilinear 4.68 eggs 5.06 eggs 8.2%  
Brood size 38 1968-2006 35 None        
Daily failure rate (eggs) 38 1968-2006 24 Linear decline 1.27% nests/day 0.01% nests/day -99.2% Small sample
Daily failure rate (chicks) 38 1968-2006 36 Linear decline 1.57% nests/day 0.08% nests/day -94.9%  
Laying date 38 1968-2006 30 None       Small sample

 
Clutch size graph
Brood size graph

Chick nest failure graph

Chick nest failure graph

Laying date graph

 

 

Insufficient data on CES
available for this species

 
 

Additional information
BTO blue divider
 

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This report should be cited as:
Baillie, S.R., Marchant, J.H., Leech, D.I., Joys, A.C., Noble, D.G.,
Barimore, C., Grantham, M.J., Risely, K. & Robinson, R.A. (2009).
Breeding Birds in the Wider Countryside: their conservation status 2008.
BTO Research Report No. 516. BTO, Thetford. (http://www.bto.org/birdtrends)

Pages maintained by Iain Downie, Mandy T Andrews and Laura Smith: Last updated 18.02.2009