Yellowhammer is a bird that should be common in the farmland close to where I come from in Northwest Kent. There is a mixture of arable land, growing wheat and onions on rotation as well as some pasture with plenty of old hedgerows which should supply this species with a suitable habitat, but I can walk a long way without hearing the distinct call of this fabuous bird.

In the 1980s and early 90s Yellowhammers were fairly abundant in this area where there was suitable habitat, which seemed to be anywhere where arable and pasture were side-by-side and there were a few bushes to act as song posts, but like so many farmland birds there seems to have been a huge decline in Yellowhammers in this area.

However there is one area, locally, where there is still a healthy population of Yellowhammers and a few mornings ago I made a quick visit to Castle Farm near Lullingstone along the Darent Valley where suddenly Yellowhammers become fairly common and it did not take long before I found my first one.

Although the overcast and breezy conditions at the end of July were not ideal for finding birds I came across at least three calling males and saw a female which, from her behaviour, seemed to be attending a nest. The fact that there are no Yellowhammers in the surrounding area yet they are common in this small part of the Darent Valley suggests that the local population has retracted to a small source population, which occupies ideal habitat, and that surrounding areas are only suitable for breeding at below replacement level and that the core population is only fledging enough chicks to maintain stable numbers rather than there being enough young birds each year to disperse into surrounding habitat.

Hopefully the mixed farming at Castle Farm, consisting of cattle pasture, small wheat fields, hops, barley and lavender will continue and can support the local Yellowhammer population; it would also be nice to think that one day the surrounding habitat may again be suitable for supporting Yellowhammers.

The above video footage was all obtained in the fields around Castle Farm, Lullingstone where this sound is still a familiar one in spring and summer and where winter flocks form.