Field Notes: Life returns to Glenlude

Isaac Johnston celebrates more than a decade of volunteer-led conservation and breeding bird success at Glenlude – the Trust’s site in the Scottish Borders.

The Trust took over management of Glenlude 12 years ago. Since then Karen Purvis, the Trust’s Property Manager at the site, has worked tirelessly with volunteers to restore habitats, monitor species and engage the local community at what is becoming an increasingly special wild place.

As well as undertaking vital habitat creation and restoration work, it is important to monitor how such changes have an impact on the land and the species that are present there. A wide range of monitoring takes place on Trust properties including moth trapping, dwarf shrub heath plots, mountain ringlet butterfly and breeding bird surveys.

Today, Glenlude is a wonderful place to survey birds. Transects snake through a patchwork of varied habitats, ranging from heathland and broadleaved woodland to scrub and marshy grassland.

It is clear that the Trust’s conservation interventions have made a difference in the numbers and diversity of species now at the site. In 2014, the Trust recorded 202 birds across 29 different species. Ten years on, overall numbers have more than tripled, with the most recent survey this summer recording 751 individuals across 44 different species.

Of those species, there are a few of particular significance. Tree pipits are on the UK Red List for Birds of Conservation Concern, with a range that has reduced by 29 per cent since the late 1960s, partly due to habitat loss/change.

At Glenlude, clear-felling and leaving standing deadwood have provided new areas for these charismatic little birds to breed – and plenty of ‘song posts’ from which to sing. With more forest restructuring planned, numbers are anticipated to increase further.

Although not a rare species, the population of willow warblers (pictured above) has also increased dramatically, with 97 individuals recorded in 2024, up from just 27 in 2014. Tree planting alongside effective deer management, has allowed willow and scrub to regenerate across the site – perfect for a bird that, as its name suggests, thrives in such habitat.

Whinchats, which migrate from Africa to breed here in the summer, also feature on the UK Red List and are another species to benefit from habitat improvements, especially to areas of moorland and scrub.

Overall, the future for a whole range of birds at Glenlude is now looking bright. As the Trust continues to remove stands of coniferous woodland and replace them with native woodland, there is an excitement about what new species will arrive next.

Glenlude is an example to follow in large-scale conservation with people at its heart. Such improvements wouldn’t have been possible without the help of volunteers, school groups and many others who have delivered so much valuable practical work.

About the author

Isaac Johnston is the Trust’s Thirlmere Resilience Project Officer based near Helvellyn. He has undertaken breeding bird surveys at several Trust sites, including Glenlude.

• This article first appeared in the Autumn 2024 edition of the John Muir Trust Members' Journal. If you would like to receive our Journal twice a year please consider joining the Trust as a Member.

Photograph of willow warbler courtesy of Liz Auty.