NOTE: Species accounts are no longer included within the BirdTrends report and all links to individual species in this BirdTrends report now point to the relevant species page in BirdFacts. Species trends can now be viewed in the "Trends Explorer" which allows you to view a range of temporal trends for each species.

If the status of species that have shown long-term declines were now improving, we would expect to find trends to be more positive in recent years than in the earlier part of the time series. To examine this, we list in Table B1 the best change estimates over the most recent ten-year period for which we have data (2010–20 in all but three cases), for all of the declining species listed in Tables A1–A3 (previous section). 

Table B1 also includes four further species that are listed red or amber in BoCC5 because of recent breeding decline, and for which we can report ten-year trends, but which lacked annual monitoring data before 1994. These are Swift, Whinchat, Grasshopper Warbler and Wood Warbler (all red-listed). 

Species are listed in ascending order of population change. Thus the species with the steepest recent decline appear first. Towards the foot of the table are species that remain in long-term decline but have shown partial recovery of those losses during the recent ten-year period.

As indicated by their position at the top of Table B1, there is high confidence that the breeding populations of Turtle Dove, Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, Greenfinch and Tufted Duck have halved within just the last ten years, or even a shorter period (although it should be noted that the results for Lesser Spotted Woodpecker are based on a small sample). These are the only species in long-term decline that suffered a 50% fall during 2010–20. Note that whilst the 25-year WBS/WBBS decline for Tufted Duck in Table A3 does not raise a formal alert due to wide confidence intervals, the 10-year decline is statistically significant so does raise a high alert: unless this recent steep decline is reversed it is likely that formal alerts will be raised against the longer-term trends in the future. A further 15 species also raise alerts, having declined significantly by more than 25% (but less than 50%) in their most recent ten-year period. All these declines compound earlier losses for these species.

The ongoing declines of so many of the species listed in Table B1 raises serious conservation concern. A special case is Turtle Dove, for which the 10-year decline has remained at 80% or greater in each of the last 11 BirdTrend report and shows no sign of slowing.

The 25% threshold, which is used to define decreases over the 25-year period that are worthy of amber listing, is equivalent to a change of 10.9% over ten years, assuming a constant rate of change. Thus a decrease of 11% or greater listed in Table B1 indicates that these species (34 in all, including non-significant declines for Little Grebe, Common Sandpiper, Redshank and Lesser Redpoll) are on course for new or renewed red or amber listing for breeding population decline.

A smaller decrease, or an increase, indicates that the population decline may be easing off. Species that have declined in the longer term but with losses smaller than 11%, or with no significant population change, over the ten-year period are Shelduck, Curlew, Tawny Owl, Skylark, Mistle Thrush, Nightingale, Whinchat,  Dipper, Tree Sparrow, House Sparrow, Dunnock, Grey Wagtail, Meadow Pipit, Bullfinch, Linnet and Reed Bunting.

Four species at the foot of the table show significant gains in population over the last ten years. The increases in Snipe, Song Thrush, Yellow Wagtail and  Corn Bunting numbers are very welcome but the upturns are coming from such a low level that numbers remain far below those of the mid 1970s, with the population trend graphs still showing little sign of clear recovery.