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Portrait of Cirl bunting

Nature · Birds

Cirl bunting

Resident · 15–16.5 cm

Emberiza cirlus — Emberizidae (buntings)

A Mediterranean bunting at the very northern edge of its range in Britain, where it shrank back to fewer than 120 pairs in south Devon by 1989. Targeted farmland schemes — winter stubbles and grassy margins — reversed the decline, and a reintroduction took it back into Cornwall. The male's black chin and throat, set between yellow face stripes, separates it from the yellowhammer it is always mistaken for.

How to spot them

  • â–ļMale has a black chin and throat and a black eye-stripe between bold yellow face stripes, with a grey-green breast band
  • â–ļRump is olive-grey-brown — the yellowhammer's rump is warm chestnut
  • â–ļSong is a flat, dry, rattling trill on one note, like a lesser whitethroat, not the yellowhammer's 'little bit of bread and no cheese'
  • â–ļSouth Devon farmland: sunny south-facing slopes with hedges, winter stubble and rough grass
  • â–ļFemale and juvenile are a duller, more finely streaked yellowhammer, with the same grey rump

How to know it

Male has a black chin and throat and a black eye-stripe between bold yellow face stripes, above a grey-green breast band

Cirl bunting — the head pattern separates it from the yellowhammer.

Its rump is olive-grey-brown, where its familiar yellow relative's is warm chestnut

Cirl bunting — the rump is the reliable mark on females and juveniles.

Sings a flat dry rattle on one note, quite unlike 'a little bit of bread and no cheese'

Cirl bunting — the song recalls a lesser whitethroat.

Fell to under 120 pairs confined to south Devon by 1989, then recovered with winter stubbles and grassy margins

Cirl bunting — the recovery is a textbook agri-environment success.

Reintroduced to Cornwall from 2006, extending its British range west of the Tamar again

Cirl bunting — the RSPB and National Trust translocation.

A Mediterranean bunting at the very northern edge of its range, once found as far north as Cumbria

Cirl bunting — Emberiza cirlus.

Quick-fire facts

  • â€ĒScientific name Emberiza cirlus; 'cirl' comes from the Italian zirlo, an imitation of the call
  • â€ĒAbout 1,100 territories at the 2016 national survey (BTO BirdFacts), an increase of more than 800% over 27 years
  • â€ĒRed-listed in Birds of Conservation Concern 5 (2021), and on Schedule 1 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981
  • â€ĒIt fell to fewer than 120 pairs by 1989, confined almost entirely to south Devon around Torbay and the South Hams
  • â€ĒIt once bred as far north as Cumbria and across much of southern England before 20th-century farming changes
  • â€ĒThe recovery came from agri-environment schemes providing winter stubbles for seed and rough grass margins for insects
  • â€ĒA reintroduction to Cornwall, run by the RSPB and partners, released birds from 2006, restoring the species west of the Tamar
  • â€ĒThe range still contracted by about 84% between the 1968–72 and 2008–11 breeding atlases, even with the recent recovery
  • â€ĒIt is largely sedentary and stays within a kilometre or two of its breeding site all year, which is why recolonisation is so slow

Drill it — 8 cards

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Sources