Seeing your favourite Blue Tit or Blackbird being taken by a Sparrowhawk can be distressing but it is worth remembering that the Sparrowhawk is a native predator and, as such, it is part of the natural system. Other predators are not native (like the pet cats that many of us own).There are two types of predator that will take garden birds; those that take fully-grown birds and those that tend to predate the nests and young of birds during the breeding season.

The real specialist predator of fully-grown birds is the Sparrowhawk. This raptor is designed to prey on smaller birds (up to the size of a young Woodpigeon). It is really a woodland bird, having short wings and a long tail that help it maneouvre through trees and branches in pursuit of its prey.Sparrowhawk predation can help to regulate the numbers of smaller birds and, by the same token, the availability of small birds can influence the size of the Sparrowhawk predation. It is therefore extremely unlikely that Sparrowhawk predation could cause the long-term decline of some small bird species that has been witnessed in recent decades. In fact, despite research looking specifically at this issue, there is no evidence whatsoever to suggest that Sparrowhawks may have caused the observed population declines. The real culprit is likely to be changes in the way in which we manage the countryside.