Estuary birds change with climate

Avocets attract thousands of visitors to the Devon area each winter

Climate change is affecting the patterns of birds passing through a Devon estuary, the RSPB has said.

Numbers are up of avocets and black-tailed godwits, which use the Exe Estuary in their hundreds each winter.

But fewer brent geese, bar-tailed godwits, dunlins and ringed plovers are coming, according to the RSPB report, The State of the UK's Birds 2006.

The report says many wildfowl no longer need to migrate as far as the UK from the north because of warmer winters.

It highlights a doubling of about 39 species of waterbirds, ducks, geese, swans and wading birds spending the winter in the UK in the last three decades but says that wintering populations of some species are declining.

Although there is some good news from the Exe, we mustn't be lulled into a false sense of security Peter Exley, RSPB

The RSPB says a common theme appears to be climate change.

Avocets and black-tailed godwits attract thousands of visitors to the Devon area each winter.

The RSPB says winter visitors such as little egrets and spoonbills regularly come to the Exe Estuary now, which may be another indicator of a changing climate.

Peter Exley, of the RSPB, said: "Although there is some good news from the Exe, we mustn't be lulled into a false sense of security.

"The evidence is growing that the impacts of climate change are starting to bite so it's vital that we continue to manage and protect the UK's world-renowned network of internationally important waterbird sites if we are to minimise the negative effects of climate change on our wintering birds."