Urgent - need wildlife gardening statistical reference

[Tursiops2]

In "The Green Garden Expert" by Dr DG Hessayon it states:

"80% of garden owners are doing something to encourage wildlife, or would do so if they knew how to go about it. Six in every ten adults feed garden birds"

Can anybody give me a reference for these statistics, or point me in the direction of others? They will be a core element in a presentation I may have to give in the near future, so I'd be grateful for any help.
T2

[Malcolm Fraser]

The qualification he gives makes the whole claim sound spurious to me.

Try one of Ken Thompson's books for a more rigorous scientific examination of wildlife gardening - particularly "No Nettles Required" and possibly also "An Ear To The Ground"

[Hedera]

The RSPB have done surveys asking who feeds birds, and types of garden etc.

[loripo]

DEFRA have quite a lot of statistical data on wildlife. I did copy the link and then couldnt find this! I searched on everything and it didnt find it but I thought I remembered it as one of yours - whew!

saying 9 out of 10 etc doesnt sound very scientific - round here 9 out of 10 people dont have an 'outside' - it's all flats.

[Monkey Orchid]

Tricky to find statistics on this... I would agree that the RSPB might have some useful data about bird feeding and general wildlife gardening, and maybe the Wildlife Trusts as well. I did wonder if the BBC Breathing Spaces web pages would have any data, but unfortunately not.

A (very quick) Google trawl for statistics produced only the statement that 80% of all ponds in the UK are now found in private gardens. Unfortunately the source for this figure was not given in the article! It's frustrating when people don't reference their source materials...

[nightshade]

I seem to remember a Sheffield Garden Project (or some similar title) to see just what habitats were offered by urban gardens and BUGS (another bio diversity project) also the RSPB

[Malcolm Fraser]

The Sheffield projects was called Biodiversity in Urban Gardens (BUGS), and generated a series of papers in scientific literature and British Wildlife. Ken Thomson used the projects as the basis of his book"No Nettles Required" - which is a must-read, it challenges a lot of accepted lore on wildlife gardening.

More BUGS info here: BUGS 2 Results and updates

[Hedera]

Another suggestion - try the phenology sites, e.g. Woodland Trust.

[loripo]

Suburban gardens 'play vital role' - Yahoo! News UK

Todays news - not sure about the building on farmland bit tho! Remembered this thread as it mentions Dr Thompson & BUGS

[Tursiops2]

Thanks for the responses everybody. I've emailed the RSPB and put the (very interesting) BUGS website in my favourites .
T2