Photo: Male Stonechat, by courtesy of Richmond Park Bird Recording Group
See the latest report on bird species spotted in Richmond Park in 2016.
The Richmond Park Bird Recording Group carries out regular sessions during the year to identify the number of different bird species present, both popular and rare. The findings are published in a report covering the last 10 years, and here is the latest for 2016 compiled by Jan Wilczur and Nigel Jackman.
The report includes 114 different species spotted in 2016, and over the last 10 years a total of 168 species have been spotted. 209 specieshave been seen since 1921 when records began.
Richmond Park is an ancient parkland with an area of almost 2,500 acres (1,000 hectares) comprising diverse habitats such as ancient trees and decaying wood, grasslands, bracken, wetlands and waterbodies (including the Pen Ponds). Consequently it attracts a wide variety of birds, both resident and migrating.
The populations of some species resident in the Park, namely skylark, little owl, jackdaw, all three woodpeckers, reed bunting and stonechat, are significant in the London context. As these records show, some species are in decline locally, as well as nationally, but the Park can often reward the alert observer, occasionally with a species never before or rarely seen within its confines or airspace.
Download the report now