​I am standing by a telescope on Upham Meadow and the Summer Leasow, 257 acres of wet grassland by the River Avon near its confluence with the Severn. This is said to be the largest hay meadow in Britain. With me are two energetic campaigners for Eurasian curlews, which are in headlong decline in the UK, and throughout their global range; BBC producer Mary Colwell, (check out her website http://www.curlewcall.org/​), and Mike Smart of Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust. 

​The grass is not yet long enough to conceal birdlife; a scan of this vast flatland reveals fourteen curlews alongside several crows and lesser black-backed gulls. We are here to record their evocative songs and calls, to discuss ways of classifying what they mean, and how this can help with their conservation. 

For an opportunity to learn more about curlews, and to observe and listen to them safely at close quarters, come to the Bolton Castle Curlew Festival in June.

​I have a couple of free hours between a meeting in St James's Square and another in South Kensington; London being what it is I can walk almost the entire journey of over two miles through green spaces; despite an icy wind I hear a dunnock singing as I emerge into Green Park. Wood pigeons graze and a pair of magpies, which have every reason to be shy birds in the countryside, allow me to approach and enjoy the wonderful cobalt sheen to their feathers. I hear a mistle thrush singing in the distance and walk over; he too allows me close enough to photograph (below).
 

​I cross into Hyde Park and spot ring-necked parakeets on some feeders; several people are photographing them with mobile phones. I was just in East Anglia where, for all the successful outreach by conservation bodies, midweek birdwatchers are inevitably mostly Anglo-Saxon and retired; here people of all ages and ethnicities stop to take a look, and maybe a selfie, as part of their daily routine. The birds would have looked equally unusual at Minsmere; ring-necked parakeets are natives of Africa and Asia, with a separate subspecies in each. They have long been popular as pets due to their colourful plumage, acrobatic skills and ability to mimic the human voice. The Ancient Greeks kept the Indian subspecies, and the Ancient Romans the African one. The Indian subspecies is declining fast in the wild, but is naturalised in many cities around the world, including London where they first bred in 1969. They are spreading fast around England and Wales.

Medieval Suffolk was wealthy, well populated, commercialised and urbanised. Dunwich was a major international port. A mile or two away, Minsmere (now a flagship RSPB reserve) was a broad tidal estuary with a small port of its own. Boats must have been everywhere. Dunwich gradually declined from the 14th century and eroded into the sea; from the early 17th century a sand spit gradually blocked the mouth of Minsmere estuary, creating a huge tidal lagoon - a haven for smugglers. The spit closed up in 1780, and briefly creating a freshwater marsh, which may have looked like it does now (above). In the 1810s it was drained and the land was reclaimed for grazing. Soon afterwards local landowners, the Ogilvies, planted up the surrounding sandlings (treeless heaths used for rabbit warrens and grazing sheep), for hunting and shooting.

​The grazing marshes remained until 1940, when Minsmere beach (above) was identified as an easy landing area for German invaders. Concrete blocks were lined up along the spit to keep out tanks (right), mines were laid, and barbed wire was stretched along the beach. The hamlet by the main sluice gate was evacuated and used by the RAF for target practice; grazing marshes were flooded.​

To counteract this the Minsmere Scrape (below) was created in 1962, a pioneering piece of artificial habitat creation by warden Bert Axell, a great conservationist and character (read this) but not a big fan of visitors ('they're wasting my bloody time'). When I first visited on a family holiday in 1974, my father had to write off to RSPB headquarters for a permit for us to be shown round on a specific day. Health and safety had yet to appear and I fell down a hole in one of the hides and broke a toe. This was a blessing in disguise, as I got a personalized wheelchair ride round the reserve; since then I have followed the reserve's development.​

The RSPB bought Minsmere in 1977, building it up to its present 2500 acres. The Scrape was enthusiastically admired and imitated by conservationists as far away as Japan, but many local people regarded Minsmere as somewhere where they were not welcome, and it was feared that increased visitor numbers would effect rare breeding species. Eventually public consultations were held about how to make the reserve attractive to locals. From 2014-16 Springwatch was filmed at Minsmere for three years, causing a massive spike in visitor numbers and public profile. On recent evenings flocks of people, not all regular birdwatchers, have convened to see murmurations of up to 40,000 starlings. Interestingly numbers of rare breeding species have risen incrementally with the number of visitors, which is now around 120,000 per year; I wonder what Bert Axell would have thought.​

Minsmere is part of Suffolk Coast and Heaths Area of Natural beauty, marketed as 'unspoiled'; its swaying reeds can conjure up an impression of remote timelessness. In fact it has frequently been 'spoiled' by both man and nature; scratch the surface and you realize that this remarkably bio-diverse landscape is in a constant state of flux. ​​​Due to rising sea levels it could to revert to a tidal estuary within this century; in the short run increased water abstraction for cooling at the new Sizewell C nuclear power station next door may alter the delicate balance between fresh and saline water.

                                           Recent colonists: nuclear power station and little egret

​I've been coming to Elshieshields near Lochmaben in South-West Scotland for the past fifteen years. During this time there have been obvious changes to birdlife in its 20 acres of mixed woodland on the banks of the river Ae. 15 years ago nuthatches were just establishing themselves in Scotland; now they are common here, encouraged by global warming and more bird feeding (left), without which cold weather such as this might have killed them in the past. On the debit side, ten years ago the fields around here resounded with the bubbling of curlews in spring; last year I heard only one, briefly. Their breeding habitat has been drained, and the few corners left are easily found and worked over by predators. Lapwings are going the same way.

​How about the more distant past? I look up Lochmaben in the Scottish Statistical Accounts; in 1845 the local minister Thomas Marjoribanks lists birds in his parish. Many are still here, sometimes under different names: white owl (our barn owl), water-ouzel (our dipper-'most destructive to the salmon fry'), golden-crested wren (goldcrest), willow or silver-wren (willow warbler and chiffchaff, lumped together as one species), white and yellow (pied and grey) wagtails. Three species Marjoribanks specifically ascribes to Elshieshields, 'missel-thrush', 'long-tailed titmouse' and jay, are still on site. Like me Marjoribanks enjoyed locating local rarities- I too have found quail, but not butcher-bird (red-backed shrike). Finches are lumped together as 'various species of linnet'; life was hard without binoculars.

The landscape was different then; in 1845 stone-chats were 'in great abundance on the Lochmaben Moors', and both black-cock and red grouse bred within a mile of town; goat-suckers (nightjars) were frequently seen. These moorland birds are long gone along with the moors. The parish church used to be thatched with dried heather; now hardly any heather grows in the parish. Marshland birds have also decreased; snipe are still here in winter but no longer 'particularly common'; water-rail was 'abundant about the outlets from the lakes', now they are rare. 
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