Constant Nest Monitoring Plots

The Constant Nest Monitoring Programme is an exciting and important new scheme designed to complement the existing Nest Record Scheme by providing additional information on breeding success throughout the season and relationships between productivity and habitat. The programme is being developed as a way to achieve a more structured and standardised form of nest recording and will allow us to answer even more questions about our breeding birds.

The basic idea is that nest recorders monitor the breeding activity of one or more species on defined monitoring plots. These plots will be monitored every year and we are asking observers to record any habitat changes in their plots, along with details of search effort (eg number of hours in the field) and counts of the number of pairs present of each study species. An initial census of numbers is important as this allows us to assess levels of coverage (ie the proportion of breeding pairs nests found). We would expect observers to record nests throughout the entire breeding season of their chosen species and plots should be large enough to include at least one territory of the species concerned.

This year a number of pilot plots are underway throughout Britain and many Nest Recorders are keen to be involved with the project. We hope to have 20 registered plots next season (including one here at the Nunnery!) and any Nest Recorders interested should contact the Nest Records Unit (email: ) for further details.