Wild in the city: Save the joyful song of the skylark

You should be able to hear a cheeky song coming from the trees now. It’s the chiffchaff, a small brown-coloured bird. Most of these members of the warbler family arrive in mid to late March and the wooded areas of parks all over London are now definitely host to them.

The chiffchaff sings its own name in a long cheery chain of “chiffchaffchiffchaffchiffchaff”. It is a loud, reasonably high-pitched and bouncing sound. Even though the tree leaves are only just starting to unzip their buds, it is still surprisingly hard to catch sight amongst the bare branches of the little bird that’s producing this song.

You’ll end up craning your neck in an ornithological “Where’s Wally?” as you try to match the melody to the small brown body moving about quickly above you.

In some open spaces there’s an even louder song playing over your head. This comes from the skylark, another small brown bird. They are breeding just now, and will hover over their nesting grounds trilling joyfully.

These nesting grounds are in longish grass, in Richmond and Bushy Park in particular. On a warm spring day, the air is thick with their song. But the sheer volume of the song flight disguises how few breeding skylarks there are left. Just 18 pairs tried to breed in the Royal Parks last year, and this year they are under even greater threat from the increased number of people tramping over the long grass and letting their dogs rampage off the lead in these areas. If a human or dog disturbs one of these grassy nests, the birds fly up in alarm, leaving the eggs either to be crushed by our clodhopping feet or taken by crows, which often lurk close by waiting for an opportunity to strike.

Across the UK the skylark’s population has plummeted and it is now a red-listed bird, meaning it needs urgent action to save its dwindling numbers.

There is an irony here that shouldn’t be lost on those of us who noticed the birdsong more when lockdown began. We can’t let the Covid years mark the end of the joyful song of these spring birds.