“‘latex Wading birds have declined globally with pronounced declines in Western Europe. Multiple species are now IUCN Red listed, with northern lapwing (Vanellus vanellus) near threatened and declining. Declines have been attributed to poor breeding success due to high rates of predation on nests and chicks, by avian and mammalian predators. In Britain badgers (Meles meles) have increased their range and abundance, and can occur at high densities, with potential for acute local predation impacts on vulnerable wader populations. However, factors affecting rates of badger predations on wader nests remain unexplored. Using data from six years of lapwing nest monitoring at a key breeding site in North-East Scotland, we aimed to identify the factors associated with badger nest predation. The overall probability of badger predation was above 0.1 when mean daily temperature was below 4 °C in the 7 days before a nest’s completion, dropping close to zero when above 10 °C. Predation on lapwing clutches also increased with earthworm availability, and inter-annual effects were observed matching variations in temperature, whereby intense badger predation in 2021 coincided with unseasonably cold temperatures. This highlights the potential for weather forecasting to be used to deploy pre-emptive management strategies to mitigate badger predation impacts on lapwing nests.

The grey partridge population has experienced significant declines across Europe, largely due to agricultural intensification and loss of habitat, leading to conservation actions such as Red-listing in the UK and hunting bans in Greece. The genetics of Balkan and Scottish populations remain largely unexplored; genetic analyses are essential to evaluate the impact of past restocking efforts on wild populations, as breeding between released and wild-living partridges may complicate recovery efforts. In this study, we sample wild and farmed individuals of grey partridge from the Balkans (Greece, North Macedonia) and the United Kingdom (UK) and employ 2300 SNPs, eight microsatellites and two mitochondrial markers to investigate the genetic structure and diversity of their populations and the impact of past restocking activities. We reveal a clear distinction between two clades, an Eastern and a Western, as in previous studies, with wild birds from Greece and the UK classified to each clade respectively. However, birds from North Macedonia belonged to either clade, suggesting a contact zone between the two or a genetic legacy of past restocking practices. The captive stock in Greece and the UK is clearly of Western origin, with minor introgression of the Eastern clade being detected. Finally, an informative SNP marker panel is presented that accurately assigns each individual to either the Eastern or Western clade and will serve as a valuable tool for monitoring population structure, guiding conservation efforts, and assessing the impact of restocking activities on grey partridge populations.