2010 marked the nineteenth year since Dr Brendan Kavanagh saw his first wild grey partridge while conducting a baseline survey of aturraun cutaway bog. Nearly 20 years later, wild grey partridge have arrived at yet another crossroads.

The 2010 autumn population stands at 908, a long way from 21 birds in the autumn of 2001. While this figure represents the highest ever recorded we are by no means there yet. Securing the core population at Boora is only the first  step. The longer term goal of the Nation Grey Partridge Conservation Project  is to bring wild grey partridge out of isolation in Boora and back into their traditional farmland home in the Irish countryside.

Below is a table showing the Annaul population counts from 1991-2009

 

Year spring pairs %yearly change spring pairs Autumn wild origin pop % yearly change autumn wild Autmn released origin pop Autumn total pop % wild origin birds relative to total pop
1991 17 17
1992 35 +106 35
1993 38 +9 38
1994 79 79
1995 107 107
1996 42 +11 42
1997 14 55 +31 55
1998 6 +57 24 -56 24
1999 6 0 24 0 24
2000 8 +33 22 -8 22
2001 8 0 22 0 22
2002 14 +75 28 +27 55 83 34
2003 17 +21 48 71 37 85 56
2004 24 +41 66 +38 54 120 55
2005 27 +13 148 +124 12 160 93
2006 27 0 77 -48 54 131 59
2007 25 -7 n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a
2008 18 -28 144 242 40
2009 32 78 220 +124 253 473 47