130925-studie-wildlife-comeback-in-europe

Country No. of breeding pairs Trend Year %
Austria 12–19 Stable 2008
Belarus 1–5 Stable [14] 2008
Belgium 150 + 2008 1
Bulgaria 0–1 ? 2008
Czech Republic 100–120 + 2007
Denmark 75–80 + 2008
France 2,656 Stable 2009 [15] 11
Germany 10,100–12,300 Stable 2009 [16] 47
Hungary 5–10 Stable 2010 [17]
Republic of Ireland 25–35 + [18] 2013 [18]
Italy 314–426 + 2008 2
Latvia 1 + 2010 [19]
Liechtenstein 0–1 ? 2008
Lithuania 10–20 + 2013 [20]
Luxembourg 40 Stable 2009 [21]
Netherlands 1 ? 2012 [22]
Poland 1,000–1,500 + [14] 2009 [23] 5
Portugal 36–67 - [14] 2001
Russia 5–10 ? 2003
Serbia 4–6 ? 2008 [24]
Slovakia 10–15 - 2012 [25]
Spain 2,000–2,200 - [14] 2005 9
Sweden 1,933–2,181 + 2012 [26] 9
Switzerland 1,200–1,500 + 2009 [27] 6
UK 2,200 + 2013 [28] 9
Table 2. Latest Red kite population estimates in Europe, indicating those
countries with more than 1% of the total population. Unless otherwise stated,
data are from Aebischer (2009) [4] .
Table 3. Major threats that drove Red kite decline and may still constrain the
population [14] .
Threat Description Impact
Unintentional Poisoning from illegal baits.
Critical
effects of hunting
and collecting Secondary poisoning from consumption of
rodents poisoned with rodenticides in managed
High
grasslands.
Hunting and
collecting
Agricultural
intensification
Livestock farming
and ranching
Renewable
energy
Transportation
and service
corridors
Wood and pulp
plantations
Secondary lead poisoning.
Illegal shooting and trapping.
Habitat degradation and loss due to agricultural
intensification, especially ploughing of permanent
grasslands and homogenisation of the farmed
landscape. Loss of non-farmed elements, e.g.
hedgerows, trees, uncultivated field edges, results
in loss of nesting and feeding sites.
Farming activities also cause disturbance of
nesting or roosting sites.
EU sanitary legislation prohibited leaving livestock
carcasses, which resulted in a decrease in food
availability.
Collision with wind turbines, particularly during
the breeding season.
Electrocution on power cables.
Disturbance from forestry operations, particularly
in some areas of eastern Europe.
Low
Medium/high
Medium/high
Medium
Medium,
potentially
growing
Low
Low (local)
Norway and Denmark [2] . More recently, severe
range contractions took place in the Baltic States,
the Balkans, central and eastern Europe and southwestern
Russia [2, 31] (Figure 2).
From the 1970s, Red kites began recolonizing
parts of their range, including Denmark and
Belgium [2, 12, 31] , while reintroduction projects
resulted in the recolonisation of the British Isles [14, 18] .
Major threats
Until the mid-1950s, major declines in Red kite
populations were caused by intensive persecution,
especially during 1850–1900 [2, 30–32] . From the 1960s,
habitat degradation due to agricultural intensification,
but also the decline in grazing livestock,
negatively affected Red kites in southern and
eastern Europe [14, 30] . In Germany, land-use change
and the intensification of agriculture following
reunification of the country in 1989 resulted in
habitat degradation and was the main cause for
the decline in the German Red kite population in
the 1990s [4, 33] .
The main driver for the modern decline of
the species is mortality through poisoning [6, 14] .
As facultative scavengers, Red kites are particularly
sensitive to the illegal use of poison for
control of foxes, wolves, corvids, etc. Recent cases
include 43% of known causes of mortality in
France between 2002 and 2007 [34] , 40% in Scotland
between 1989 and 2006 [35] , and possibly four birds
in Northern Ireland so far in 2013 [36] . Red kites are
also highly susceptible to secondary poisoning
from consumption of poisoned rodents. Rodenticides
are used to control vole outbreaks in agricultural
areas and scavengers feed on the poisoned
carcasses [6, 14] . This is a major threat, particularly in
Spain and France, where the migratory population
of Red kites winters [13] .
Mortality of wintering birds caused by
secondary poisoning following rodent control
campaigns could partially explain the declines
suffered by the breeding populations of France and
Germany [6] . It is interesting to note that in several
of the populations that are stable or increasing,
such as UK, Sweden, Italy, Czech Republic, and
the region of Auvergne in France, many birds are
sedentary, and lack of exposure to poisoning in
the wintering grounds has been suggested as a
factor behind the positive trends in these populations
[3, 6, 33] .
Other threats include illegal persecution of
the species, prey declines and loss of breeding
and foraging habitat due to agricultural intensification,
expansion of windfarms and electrocution
by power cables [10, 13, 14, 37] .
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