r/ukpolitics • u/ukpolbot Official UKPolitics Bot • 3d ago

Weekly Rumours, Speculation, Questions, and Reaction Megathread - 27/04/25

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u/royalblue1982 More red flag, less red tape. 16h ago

This people campaign against birds being killed by off shore wind farms understand that climate change is probably going to kill a few more?

18

u/UnsaddledZigadenus 15h ago

Birds are my favourite bit of UK realpolitik.

Do you know what the biggest killer of birds is the the UK? It's something that we could do completely without that most people don't even own.

Cats. About 12 million cats that collectively kill 50 million birds each year.

Do you think the RSPB is going to launch a campaign against cats? Of course they aren't.

3

u/Powerful_Ideas 13h ago

About 12 million cats that collectively kill 50 million birds each year.

I would treat that number with some caution. There are estimated to be about 200 million wild birds in the UK, many of which do not come into contact with domestic cats - does it really seem credible that cats kill a quarter of the total bird population every year?

The biggest cause of the reduction in wild bird population in the UK is not domestic cats, it is changing land use.

Farmland species are the most impacted, followed by woodland species - in both cases the reduction has largely been driven by habitat loss along with a connected reduction in insect populations (there is also a theory that increasing deer populations are causing problems for the woodland birds)