Westmoor Barn Owl Scheme
In late February 2009, the Barn Owl Trust launched their latest Barn Owl Scheme aimed at increasing Barn Owl populations in parts of West Devon. This was made possible thanks to significant funding from Biffaward and the Devon Bird Watching & Preservation Society. Dartmoor National Park, Devon County Council and West Devon Borough Council have also contributed. This Scheme follows on from successful Schemes carried out in other Devon Districts including East Devon, North Devon, South Hams and Teignbridge between 1997 and 2003. All of the Schemes saw an increase in Barn Owl numbers upon completion; it is hoped the same success will befall this new Scheme. The Scheme is due to run for 18 months, coming to an end in August 2010.

Reasons for the Scheme
The new scheme will focus on the area between West Dartmoor and the River Tamar (see map below), as it was the only area to show a significant decline in Barn Owl numbers between the last two County surveys. The number of nest records fell from 16 in 1993 to only 2 in 2003, a decline of 87.5%. This was in marked contrast to the rest of Devon, where numbers went up by an estimated 42% to between 350-470 pairs (250-350 pairs estimated in 1993). Good news for the County but not for West Devon. David Ramsden MBE, Head of Conservation at the Barn Owl Trust said "The severe decline of Barn Owls in the area between West Dartmoor and the Tamar is something of a mystery and these beautiful birds really do need all the help they can get. The new project will provide free advice to landowners and farmers about creating areas of perfect Barn Owl habitat. We'll also be erecting over a hundred new nestboxes and we'd be really pleased to hear from anyone who wants to get involved".

Nesting success is ultimately controlled by food availability and starvation is the main cause of mortality in Barn Owls. Therefore food supply exerts the greatest influence over Barn Owl populations. Food availability in turn, is largely controlled by the quality and amount of foraging habitat. The main prey item of British Barn Owls is the Field Vole Microtus agrestis, which make their tunnel systems in the litter or thatch layer of dead grass. Therefore, areas of intensively grazed pasture are virtual deserts to Barn Owls; arable landscapes are marginally better until harvest-time, as are hay meadows. However, intensively grazed pasture with headlands, margins and field corners left to become rough grassland are much improved for Barn Owls.

Westmoor boundary map (Googlemaps ©2009)

Our aims and how we hope to achieve them
Obviously our aim is to increase Barn Owl numbers in West Devon between the A38 and the A30. We hope to achieve this by working with farmers and landowners in order to improve habitat for Barn Owls and erect nestboxes in appropriate places.

At 23 sites, the Scheme will be applying a full package of conservation measures, which include erecting up to 3 nestboxes, giving advice about improving habitat, providing advice on safer rodenticide use and installing floats in water troughs. The 23 sites are being chosen on the basis of whether nesting has occurred since the Devon county survey in 1993. The 1993 Devon county survey found 16 nesting sites but by the 2003 Devon county survey this had decreased to 2 nesting sites. We hope to include all 16 of these historic nesting sites in the Scheme and also identify a further 7 sites where nesting has occurred or where Barn Owls are regularly roosting that currently offers no nesting opportunity. If we can improve foraging habitat and provide various nesting opportunities then hopefully we can secure all these nesting sites for the future.

In addition, we will be erecting nestboxes at 50 sites that either already have Barn Owls around but no suitable nesting places, or have great habitat but no Barn Owls as yet; the provision of a nestbox may encourage any dispersing juvenile Barn Owls to take up residence!

Furthermore, we are offering free advisory visits to 50 sites; this may be to provide advice on improving habitat, on making permanent provision for Barn Owls in an outbuilding or loft space, on the use of safer alternatives to second generation rodenticides or indeed any other aspect of Barn Owl conservation.

If, during the course of the Westmoor Scheme we happen upon an area of outstanding Barn Owl habitat that has no trees or buildings in the vicinity, we have allocated money from the Biffaward funding for the erection of a Polebox. If you have any areas of good rough grassland habitat that is permanent and is situated amongst other patches of rough grassland, we would love to hear from you!

Progress to date
The Westmoor Scheme has been up and running for more than a year now, and progress has been rapid. Almost every landowner we have approached has been more than happy to work with us, and we have already carried out over 160 identification visits, despite initially planning for just 92.

Since the commencement of the Westmoor Scheme in February last year, there have been:

161 identification visits carried out.
23 x Stage 1 visits completed.
16 x Stage 2 visits completed.
11 x Stage 3 visits completed
30 x Advisory visits made.
31 x Nestboxing visits made.

In total so far 70 Deep Indoor Nestboxes, and 14 Outdoor Nestboxes have been erected. We have found a suitable site for our one and only Polebox and we hope to have that in place soon!