Theme 1 - Life cycles

To sustain birdlife a farm needs to have places for nesting, places to find food, and places for shelter. These need to be local. It is no good if the feeding areas are miles away from the nesting areas. Different birds have different needs, but if you cater for the gamebirds a whole range of others will benefit too.

Partridges and pheasants nest on the ground so a dense ground cover of grass and perennials is what they want. The best way of providing this is by having a wide base to hedgerows and broad edges to woodlands. ELS options for hedgerow (EB1 & EB2) and woodland edges (EC4) are designed to give at least a one metre margin of perennial herbs and grass.

If these are not wide enough to allow a thick ground flora to develop (as say next to a tall hedge or along the north side of a wood) then widen the area with a buffer strip (EE1-6). Additional nesting areas away from hedges and woods can be provided by beetle banks (EF7), field corners (EF1) and buffer strips (EE1-6). Don’t over-manage these areas.

On wide buffer strips you are required to cut half annually but it is in uncut dead grass that partridges and other birds choose to nest. Next to these nesting areas there needs to be habitats where a hen bird can take her brood after the chicks hatch.

Pheasant and partridge broods need to forage amongst the stems of tall plants where they can find insects, and where a canopy protects them from predators and weather.  Thick grass doesn’t do this; it tends to leave the chicks wet, exposed and immobile. So next to the good nesting cover there needs to be foraging areas - conservation headlands (EF9-10) and strips of wild bird seed mixture (EF2 & EF3) are ideal, but also consider wildbird cover under set-aside rules.

After harvest and, in winter, birds need cover and food. Brassica fodder crops (EG5) and over winter stubbles (EF6) suit many species but specific wild bird seed mixtures (EF2 & EF3) are best