The British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) is an organisation founded in 1932 for the study of birds in the British Isles. The BTO carries out research into the lives of birds, chiefly by conducting population and breeding surveys and by bird ringing, largely carried out by a large number of volunteers. Its Garden Birdwatch survey, for example, allows large numbers of non-expert birdwatchers to participate, by making a weekly count of the birds they see in their gardens. The BTO publishes a number of journals: In September 1967, inspired by on-going work on the innovative Atlas of Breeding Birds of the West Midlands, produced by the West Midland Bird Club, and in partnership with the Irish Wildbird Conservancy (now BirdWatch Ireland), work began on the first Atlas of Breeding Birds in Britain and Ireland. 3,862 10 km squares were surveyed and the atlas was published in 1976. The New Atlas (1993) updated and refined this huge survey, again with the help of IWC and the Scottish Ornithologists Club. A Winter Atlas and a Historical Atlas have also been published.

Website
http://www.bto.org/
Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Trust_for_Ornithology

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Feeding garden birds shown to affect their evolution

New research by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) has revealed that bird food provided in British gardens has helped Blackcaps to rapidly evolve a successful new migration route. This is the first time that garden bird ...

Chasing a changing climate

Is it better to live in the north or the south? It's a question that even birds are struggling to answer as the climate in different parts of Britain changes in a variety of ways. Scientists have known for some time that ...