RESTORATION of Dorset heathland is helping some of the county's rarest birds make a comeback but changes in farming practices spell a decline in some of the more common species.

"There are good signals that some birds are beginning to respond or have responded," said Peter Exley, spokesman for the RSPB in the South-West.

"But on farmland they have gone down because we have tended to subsidise farmers to farm their land very intensively."

This results in a decline in bird food such as seeds, insects and small mammals. But the situation was improving with farmers feeding birds on spare grain, said John Day, senior site manager for the RSPB in Dorset.

A national report on the UK's birds says a dozen of the most threatened birds are fighting back with increased numbers.

In Dorset among garden birds the song thrush has staged a dramatic comeback and on heathland the woodlark and nightjar are doing well, along with woodland blue tits and great tits.

The county plays host to 8-10 per cent of the UK total of the woodlark and 15 per cent of the nightjar population.

But garden birds such as the house sparrow, bullfinch and starling are declining, farmland birds including the yellowhammer and grey partridge and woodland birds like the willow tit are suffering.

While wetland birds lapwings and snipe are disappearing, in Poole Harbour there has been considerable success with the avocet and little egret.

"There are certainly more than 1,000 little egret along the South Coast," said John.

"It will be a familiar bird to everyone within the next 10 years."

Surveys by the Poole Harbour Study Group show a decline in the numbers of breeding redshank in the saltmarshes but what is believed to be a nationally important numbers of water rail in the reedbeds.

The last survey of Dartford Warbler in 1992 revealed 1,650 pairs and there could be double that number now, and among birds of prey buzzards and sparrow hawks are doing well but kestrels are suffering from a decline in small mammal numbers.

First published: August 27