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It makes a change to be able to report on some encouraging news in the form of a new report published by our partner organisation, the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO), that reveals some glimmers of hope, as it would seem that 2025 proved successful for many of the UK’s favourite breeding songbirds.

Scientists from BTO are reporting that many of our resident and migratory songbirds had a highly successful nesting season in 2025, thanks to a warm and sunny spring and summer. This increase in the number of chicks reared last year is very welcome following the extremely wet summer of 2024. During that breeding season, many young birds either died in the nest or soon after leaving it. Despite this improvement in breeding success, several species are continuing to decline in the long term.

During 2025, the BTO’s team of trained volunteer bird ringers across the UK monitored 29 songbird species at specified locations. This was all carried out under BTO’s Constant Effort Sites (CES) scheme. This project, launched in 1983, involves participants catching birds at the same place in the same way throughout the summer, allowing scientists to see how numbers of adults and newly fledged young are changing over time, and whether they are surviving better or worse than in previous decades. Similar projects run across Europe, allowing us to understand what is happening to populations on a Continental scale.

Numbers of adult birds were lower than average for many resident birds, including Blue Tit and Great Tit, this summer, and the same was true for migrant birds that winter in Africa, such as Willow Warbler, Garden Warbler and Whitethroat. This drop is most likely due to the lack of new recruits into the breeding population from 2024, but the 2025 breeding season could not have been more different.

Dr Ellie Leech, Head of the Ringing Scheme, said, “Thanks to the fantastic efforts of BTO bird ringers, we know that the breeding success of 14 species was higher than average in 2025, in large part due to the mild weather.”

She added, “This is welcome news, but the contrast between the sunny summer of 2025 and the continual downpours of 2024 could not be more stark, and shows just how important the weather can be; this is particularly for young birds that are less well insulated and less experienced at finding food in difficult conditions. Several of the species monitored on CES sites, such as Willow Warbler and Garden Warbler, are exhibiting long-term declines, and if, as projected, climatic change brings an increase in unsettled weather conditions, this could make matters worse. This is why it is so important to keep projects like CES going for the next 40 years and beyond.”

Let us hope we are able to report on further improvements in songbird and other species numbers over the coming years.

To read the report, visit bto.org/ces-2025-report