Stand management: a threat or opportunity for birds in British woodland?

Abstract

Recent studies have suggested that the neglect of stand management is having a detrimental effect on the habitat of a number of woodland birds in Britain. The remedy, to reinstate active management, appears to run counter to a number of other conservation recommendations such as re‐wilding and naturalizing of stands. We attempt to unpick this apparent conflict by considering the resource needs of British woodland birds relative to those of birds elsewhere in Europe, and whether these needs differ between those with declining and those with increasing populations. We also consider how these requirements relate to stand management and stand dynamics and consider options for future management. We found that whilst stand stage per se did not discriminate between the declining and increasing species pools, correspondence analysis suggested that there were differences between the groups in their preferred habitat features. Declining woodland birds in Britain appear to be most closely associated with the presence of deciduous trees in the stand, an open canopy, and ecotonal structures. Species present in the near continent, but not in Britain, were associated with deciduous snags, large trees, canopy layer and holes. Species increasing in Britain were located between these groups on an axis of woodland maturity, and most strongly associated with habitat features of canopy layer and holes. Stand management can help provide the structures apparently preferred by many of the declining species and, if targeted, can deliver them at a more rapid rate than development of similar features through natural stand dynamics. However, there are often multiple pathways to particular structures and a single recommendation of active management is likely to be insufficient to secure the necessary features in most situations. In addition, habitat features important in Europe as a whole may not be the most critical at a local or regional scale. The varying requirements of the different species pools suggest that greater recognition of this would be appropriate in developing conservation strategies in different regions, and greater clarity is desirable over conservation objectives and habitat structures for particular woodlands.