Return of the butterscotch humbugs

PRAWLE POINT, DEVON

This flock of chattering farmland birds is delightful enough in itself. It’s also the sign of a conservation success story

Up ahead, beneath dried splinters of cut kale, the ground appears to shift. A ripple of small birds is working its way through the stubble in the morning sun, foraging on fallen seed. Occasionally, they raise their heads, striped like humbugs, the colour of caramel or butterscotch, and I count quickly, scarcely able to believe my luck.

I came to this sloping stretch of farmland on the south Devon coast in the hope of spotting just one of these rare, sparrow-sized birds. Instead, I’m watching a chattering flock of at least a dozen.

They are cirl buntings – pronounced ‘sirl’ – and these close relatives of the yellowhammer have every reason to sound chirpy. Once spread across thirty-nine counties, cirl buntings drained from the countryside during the twentieth century as agricultural practices intensified, leaving just over a hundred pairs in the West Country. In the 1990s, the RSPB launched a desperate bid to save the species from UK extinction, working with local farmers to ensure hedge-lined fields and coastal scrub were providing sufficient food and nesting sites.

It worked – these yellow and brown buntings now number more than a thousand pairs, strung out along the southern edge of Devon and Cornwall. And while still far from common (they remain the UK’s rarest resident farmland bird), the cirl bunting embodies something every bit as scarce these days: a wildlife good news story.

They fly to a nearby blackthorn bush overlooking the sea, perching in the sunshine, seeming to enjoy the mild weather and companionship of their kind. Among them, a handsome male in bright