In this latest addition to the British Wildlife Collection, experienced communicator and ornithologist Mike Toms draws on his personal experience of observing forests across Britain to explore our woodland bird communities, noting how they vary in time and space, and identifying the habitat characteristics that drive the patterns that we see.
 
Having set the scene by defining what woodland birds are and how they differ from birds of other habitats, Toms goes on to look at the birds themselves and their behaviour, exploring how their lives are bound to the nature of the woodland around them. An array of woodland types are covered, including young scrub important for migrant birds such as whitethroat and nightingale, coniferous plantation that provides a home for species like nightjar and goshawk, andancient, semi-natural, and managed broad-leaved woodlands and their associated bird communities.
 
In later chapters, Toms explains how the size and location of woodlands can affect bird populations, and how these populations have changed in Britain over time. It is essential, he argues, that we understand how our woodland bird communities sit within a wider European context. The book concludes by exploring the cultural importance of woodlands and their birds, and how this might shift as our increasingly urbanised population seeks to address the challenges of land-use and climate change.