Buzzard

Buzzard

Clamhán

Buzzards are one of our most easily spotted birds of prey.  They’re commonly seen sitting on poles along motorways and fence posts around fields, but on a clear day in the Spring or Summer they’re also easily spotted gliding effortlessly, high in the sky, in pairs and small groups.  The first thing you might notice is the mewing sound that they make, quite like that of a kitten.  It’s a wonderful “sound of the Summer”, that was missing from the Irish landscape for some time.

As a fairly large raptor, or bird of prey, buzzards do eat plenty of small mammals like shrews, mice, rats and rabbits, but they will also happily feed on earthworms, insects, frogs and so on.  They’re opportunistic scavengers and typically choose the easy option, so despite how common they are and despite their impressive claws and hooked beaks, you’re less likely to spot them launching a dramatic attack than with some of our smaller birds of prey like kestrels and sparrowhawks.

So common as they are now, buzzards are often overlooked as one of Ireland’s conservation success stories.  In the late 1800s, due to shooting and the use of poisons, buzzards went entirely extinct from Ireland.  In the 1930s buzzards from Scotland started to re-establish in the North of Ireland, but they ultimately went extinct again until they reappeared there in the 1960s.  From then, their recovery was largely confined to the North until the 1990s when the poison, strychnine was banned from use in Ireland.  With better controls around poisons and less persecution as people’s attitudes towards them have changed, their numbers and range have continued to spread throughout the country.

There are still people who will shoot or attempt to poison buzzards and our other birds of prey, either due to a misguided idea that they are a danger to livestock or for their own reasons.  Poisons – in particular poisons targeting rodents – are also still a problem, typically through accidental secondary poisoning.  Rodents that are dead or dying from rodenticides are taken as easy prey by our buzzards, hawks, falcons, eagles, owls, etc.  The birds and their young ingest the poisons in varying amounts leading to death or illness.  Occasional, low doses can accumulate in their systems over time, with similar effects.  Buzzards, with their wide diet and adaptability are managing to compete against these pressures better than some of our other native raptors.

If you haven’t noticed buzzards before, watch out for them sitting on poles or fence posts.  You will recognise them as quite a large, stocky looking bird, often sitting quite upright.  Keep your ears open on warm sunny days in particular, for their high-pitched mewing sound, when you’ll likely see them circling on the air high, sometimes very high, in the sky.  On a good day they can glide around a long time with barely a wing beat, hanging on their out-stretched wings, the feathers at the tips spread out like fingers. 

Once you learn to recognise buzzards, you will start see them everywhere, but don’t forget that only 30 years ago it would have been a rare sight.  Despite how often I see them, I try not to think of them as “just another buzzard”, but as a sign of hope – a reminder that it is our ability to learn, change attitudes and change our practices, that has allowed them to return to their rightful place as a part of the Irish landscape.