THE NUMBER of African migrants flying into Cornwall, such as yellow wagtails and cuckoos, has declined over the past 13 years, and bird conservation body the British Trust for Ornithology has set up a national appeal to do something about it.

Nationally, there are worrying declines in many of our African migrants.

The wood warbler and pied flycatchers have undergone declines of 60%.

Nightingales, spotted flycatchers and garden warblers are also among the group to have exhibited downward population trends. Even the willow warbler is close to being red-listed.

The yellow wagtail, which breeds in Cornwall, has declined by 47%, while other breeding birds such as the willow warbler, sedge warbler, turtle dove, garden warbler, spotted flycatcher, house martin, swift and swallow are also well down.

"Our knowledge of ecology of the migrants in their wintering grounds is extremely poor and severely hampers our ability to explain these declines and our ability to conserve this group of species," says Paul Stancliffe of the BTO.

"We lack even basic information about when birds arrive, the habitats they use and how they move around Africa.

"With worrying changes in distribution appearing in atlas maps, we really need to get started now, if we are to try to explain what is happening to African migrants."

The BTO hopes to start working on projects that fall into three main areas:

Set up special studies in Africa to try to understand how birds use different areas and habitats during the course of our winter.

Volunteers will be needed for this work.

They will look at the bigger picture of European/African migration and develop close working relationships with conservationists and scientists across a range of African countries.

They will look for evidence within data from the nest record scheme and the ringing scheme to see if problems are more closely linked to habitat and/or climate changes in the UK or within Africa.

A research project in West Africa will contribute to the understanding of when the birds arrive, what habitats the species use and how they move about through the autumn, winter and spring.

This initial investigation will help the BTO focus on more detailed ecological work that needs to take place in the wintering areas, to assess the problems faced by our long-distance migrants.

For more information go to http://www.bto.org/appeals/out_of_africa_appeal.htm