Cirl Bunting (Emberiza cirlus)
Key Details
| Taxonomic Groups: | Vertebrate > bird > Bird |
| Red List Status: | Least Concern (Breeding) [LC(br)] |
| D5 Status: | Included in the baseline Red List Index for England (Wilkins, Wilson & Brown, 2022) |
| Section 41 Status: | (not listed) |
| Taxa Included Synonym: | (none) |
| UKSI Recommended Name: | Emberiza cirlus |
| UKSI Recommended Authority: | Linnaeus, 1766 |
| UKSI Recommended Qualifier: | (none specified) |
| Red List Citation: | Stanbury et al., 2021 |
| Notes on taxonomy/listing: | (none) |
Criteria
| Question 1: | Does species need conservation or recovery in England? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Dependant on conservation actions. |
| Question 2: | Does recovery/ conservation depend on species-specific actions? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | targeted management required to reverse species decline. |
| Question 3: | At a landscape scale, would the species benefit from untargeted habitat management to increase habitat mosaics, structural diversity, or particular successional stages? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Creation of grassland-scrub mosaics in lowland arable/mixed farming landscapes could be beneficial to Cirl Bunting. |
Species Assessment
| Current step on the Species Recovery Curve (SRC): | 7. Best approach adopted at appropriate scales |
| Recovery potential/expectation: | Medium-high |
| National Monitoring Resource: | Opportunistic - sufficient |
| Species Comments: | targeted management working. Annual monitoring from 2021. |
Key Actions
Key Action 1
Proposed Action: Deliver species ecological needs (summer/winter food resource and safe nesting habitat) by providing weed-rich over winter stubbles and sympathetically managed field margins, unimproved pasture fields, hedgerows and scrub.
Action targets: 7. Best approach adopted at appropriate scales
Action type: Habitat management
Duration: >10 years
Scale of Implementation: > 500 sites
High priority sites: S Devon, Cornwall adjacent counties.
Comments: Although birds are presently confined to the SW, they should be recovered in relation to their past distribution across S England.
Key Action 2
Proposed Action: Deploy 1-1 advisory work with farmers within Cirl Bunting Range and areas of potential expansion.
Action targets: 7. Best approach adopted at appropriate scales
Action type: Advice & support
Duration: >10 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 50 sites
High priority sites: S Devon, Cornwall adjacent counties.
Comments:
Key Action 3
Proposed Action: Alleviate and mitigate for development pressures on important breeding areas through ensuring that spatial planning accounts for Cirl Bunting.
Action targets: 7. Best approach adopted at appropriate scales
Action type: Pressure mitigation
Duration: >10 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 10 sites
High priority sites: South Devon
Comments: This is a key pressure in the core breeding area in Devon.
Acknowledgment:
Data used on this website are adapted from Threatened species recovery actions 2025 baseline (JP065): Technical report and spreadsheet user guide (Natural England, 2025). Available here.