You won’t find anyone anywhere who loves birds as much as Lila Valencia. Just a glimpse of the azure flash of a kingfisher hopping around her beloved corner of south London is enough to risk making her late for the day’s commitments.
And yet, it’s a passion nested on top of a blatant lie.
Like many students, exasperated by the dire job market after graduating from university during the pandemic, Valencia found a rare opportunity to put her zoology degree to good use in the field. It was a job with a bird charity in sunny Malta.
problem? Observing London’s huge numbers of pigeons revealed the extensive scope of her birdwatching pedigree. Armed with a pair of used binoculars, a few trips to local parks, and a joke about her true level of birding, she jetted off to the Mediterranean.
“If you told me in my early 20s that I would become a bird watcher, I would have laughed because I never thought about it when I was growing up,” Valencia, 30, told CNN.
“Of course it was a lie at first, but then it actually started affecting me. That’s the problem. Once it starts, you can’t really stop it.”
Now back in London, she is a nature content creator known to her followers as ‘outsidewithlira’ and represents a full-blown birdwatching boom among Britain’s Gen Z. Around 750,000 people aged 16 to 29 across the UK now enjoy birdwatching regularly, marking a 1,088% increase since 2018, according to data shared by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) in May.
The figures come from an eight-year study of more than 24,000 people led by market research firm Fifty5Blue, which found that jewelery making was the single fastest growing hobby among the age group. This is faster than the UK birdwatching population which has increased by 47% to over 4 million people, with participation among Millennials and Gen X increasing by 216% and 66% respectively since 2018.
RSPB wildlife adviser Katie Nethercote, an expert on the myriad bird species scattered across the charity’s network of more than 200 nature reserves, has not noticed the influx of young birdwatchers.
“I’ve had really cool content thrown into my algorithm from young people out on nature reserves, just noticing a murchen nesting in London or a coot on the back of a small slow boat,” Nethercourt told CNN.
“In these times of worrying about the world, it’s always a really great positive to have a spark of passion out there.”
puffin and pokemon
According to the latest tally from the British Ornithologists’ Union, 636 bird species have been recorded in Britain, from the ever-present sparrow to the puffin that crosses the Atlantic Ocean each summer to nest on the Bempton Cliffs in Yorkshire.
“There’s so much diversity, so many different species,” Valencia said.
“They’re different. I don’t want to say Pokemon characters, but they’re actually Pokemon characters. They all live different lives, and to some people they all sound the same and look the same, but once you start learning about them, it’s a different world.”
Valencia’s insights offer a clue as to why so many young people take up hobbies primarily associated with the opposite demographic: retired older people with more time and money to spend.
No matter how reluctant the comparison to Pokémon is, it carries weight. The Japanese series skyrocketed in popularity in 2016 thanks to the huge success of Pokémon Go, a mobile app that encouraged users to venture out into the world and “catch it all.”
Birdwatching apps have clearly profited more than others based on the exact same principles. Released in January, Birdex, a self-described “Pokémon Go for birds” app, is a game of birdwatching, with each species discovered turning into virtual collectible cards that can be leveled up through further sightings and completing quests.
But the star of the scene is undoubtedly Merlin, a free bird identification app developed by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. A photo or even a sound similar to “Bird Shazam” can be used to accurately identify one species out of the 11,000 in the eBird database. The database is a crowdsourcing project also run by a New York-based research institute.
Other apps offer similar features, but none can match Merlin’s popularity. Since its launch in 2014, eBird has amassed 40 million downloads and 2 billion sightings across countries around the world, the institute’s executive director Ian Owens announced last year, noting that use of Merlin in the United States and Europe will increase by 40% and 70%, respectively, by spring 2025.
Nethercote argues that such apps are intuitive for a tech-savvy generation, help dispel the notion that birdwatching is an expensive pastime, and provide a pathway into what can be an overwhelming hobby for beginners.
“The app is a really great, easy and accessible way for people to actually say, ‘Let’s go for a 10-minute walk. I want to see what I can hear,'” Nethercourt said.
“Birdwatching is seen as an expensive hobby, but that’s not the case. You don’t need all the equipment. Most of the time, you just go to your local park, sit on your balcony or garden, or take a walk along the river. Nature is always there.”
While the app has proven popular, Valencia has another, seemingly paradoxical theory as to why birdwatchers are getting younger. The generation that grew up with cell phones wants to spend less time looking at screens.
“Personally, I think our brains are blown up. We’re so used to social media that we’re exhausted,” she said, referring to the resurgence in popularity of film cameras, MP3 players and other more analog devices.
“It’s very toxic. It’s weird because it doesn’t feel good. I feel like we’re almost addicted to being on our phones because we don’t know anything else…Many of us are coming back for a slower life and a real connection with nature and other people. Birdwatching is a great way to do that for everyone.”
“It’s the only thing that I know of today that can slow down my thoughts, slow down my thoughts, and almost completely shut them off,” she added. “I just want to be in the moment and watch the bird and see what it is. It’s really grounding. That’s why I like it. It’s a great distraction.”
Less than a year after quitting her job as a wildlife ranger in London to work full-time as an online content creator and influencer, Valencia is acutely aware of the irony of her position. But she’s uncomfortable with that, and dreams of a future where birdwatchers can confidently enjoy their hobby without relying on technology.
“The ultimate goal for me, and perhaps not in my lifetime, is to ensure that future generations live in a world where nature and people live in harmony,” explained Valencia, who spends many of her evenings tending to the Croydon Community Garden, which she co-founded.
“But it’s very strange because the way I’m doing it, and the way I’m trying to explain that message, is through cell phones and Instagram and apps, and these things are not known to be beneficial to nature or to people’s mental health.”
“If we could click our fingers, we could all live more connected to nature without using our phones,” Valencia added. “But obviously we live in this world.”
It’s a world where more and more bird species are on the verge of extinction. Data released by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) last October showed that 61% of bird species worldwide are in decline, up from 44% in 2016. Habitat loss and degradation, particularly due to agriculture and logging, has been cited as a major contributing factor.
The latest Breeding Bird Survey, published in April and co-sponsored by the RSPB, found that 34 bird species in the UK have shown long-term increases over the past 30 years, while 43 species have shown long-term declines.
Willow tit and great tit populations have declined by 92% and 53% respectively during this period, headlined by a wider trend that is a daily thorn in Nethercote.
“Unfortunately, we’ve seen a significant decline in bird species,” she says. “The UK alone is literally one of the most naturally depleted countries in the world.”
But Nethercourt has hope for the next generation to get hooked on birdwatching. She believes this hobby serves as an avenue for emotional investment in the conservation status of birds and the wider environment.
“Birdwatching is often the first step for people to become aware of what is around them, because they are everywhere and nest alongside us,” she said.
“That creates a real connection with people, because people are like, ‘Oh my god, there’s a robin nesting in a flower pot by my front door. Let’s watch it build a nest, let’s watch it raise chicks.'” It’s really a good igniter for people’s passions, which only grow around the natural world. ”
