Other human influences contributing to the decline of the birds of prey in Europe

Abstract

The wide-spread destruction of the European forests, which began in the Middle Ages, came to an end around the beginning of the nineteenth century (Dorst, 1965). Especially in Central Europe, the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century marked the turn of the tide. The cutting down of forested areas, which had accelerated during the past two hundred years, gave way to reforestation. But this also meant the substitution of pine woods for deciduous forests during the last hundred and fifty years of this period. The forest consisting entirely of pines was the ideal of the nineteenth-century foresters (Backmund, 1941; Ellenberg, 1963). Although a tendency towards mixed plantations could be distinguished by the beginning of the twentieth century, it must be regretfully noted that the conversion from deciduous to pine forests, or in other words from a biologically rich to an extremely poor milieu, is still practised. In Lower Saxony (West Germany), for instance, this conversion is encouraged by governmental subsidies (Kramer, 1968, p.c.), and in France the remaining deciduous forests are seriously threatened by the recently introduced ‘rationalisation’ policy adopted by the government (Eaux et Forêts), which will promote the large-scale planting of pine trees (Jouanin, 1967, p.c.). New pineries can also have a temporary beneficial influence in particular cases. Poulsen (1947) reported that the planting of 100,000 hectares of open land with pine trees in West Jutland had led to the presence of 6 species of raptors during the course of a century.