Places to see birds in the St Ives area
Welcome to the definitive guide to bird watching locations around St Ives. The place to figure out where to go, when to go and what you think you should be seeing .. and maybe, invent what you have seen so that you drive us all mad with jealousy. All of us know this area well and have been birding here for many years on and off. We think we know it quite well - but we're discovering new parts to it all the time.
The St Ives area is varied - with rocky headlands that gives great sea-watching for seabirds that invariably head west, to well-vegetated valleys that attract migrants. The area has some decent woodland behind St Ives as well as moorland, farmland, a reservoir and lots of scrub. It's this variation that means the species count for the area is pertty high considering the size of it. You can see the Official List here.
As with the rest of Cornwall, it's migration that really matters. Spring and autumn. Sticking out into the Atlantic ocean as it does, when birds are on the move during passage, pretty much anything can turn up ... or, sometimes, nothing at all. The main attraction has traditionally been seabirds. Auks, Gannets, Kittiwakes - are common, regular and guaranteed all year. But between late July-ish and early October-ish when seabirds are dispersing to their winter quarters, that is when the volume of birds really ramps up and that is when the rarer shearwaters, skuas and petrels can sometime be seen passing west as they head towards the exit of UK waters. By the same token, its not just seabirds that are dispersing - from early September through to early November is when passerines and other birds are migrating and Cornwall again gets more than its share of migrants dropping in. Whilst we don't pretend we are Porthgwarra or the Scillies - St Ives is well positioned with great habitat to scoop up at least some of those migrant birds. Well, that's the theory anyway ...
At the top of the page is the map that defines the "St Ives 20K" area. It is approximately 20 km squared (go figure!) and covers the areas we like to spend time in. From St Ives Island in the North East, heading West via Clodgy Point, Bussow Reservoir and Treveal valley over to Zennor Head. From Zennor, heading south and stopping for a pint of TinMaid at The Tinner's Arms, up the Foage Valley to Foage Farm in the South West and across east to Buttermilk Hill and on to Carbis Bay via Steeple Woods. Some of you may well ask, as we have asked ourselves many times - why we haven't included Hayle Estuary? Well, we did think about it for a bit - but Hayle is so well watched, by lots of people, locals and visitors, and its also an RSPB location and if we tried to call it "ours" we'd only be kidding ourselves, and to be honest you could spend all day every day at Hayle and its environs and you wouldn't have time for anything else. So, we go as far as Carbis Bay beach and no further.
All of these places we have mentioned below have had good birds at one time or another - and that's without really trying. Creating this map made us realise that even we haven't fully explored all of these habitats properly - which is something we're committed to rectifying.
"The Island" at St Ives
We're going to try and get through this whole article without mentioning the Great Day back in the 1980's... when the wind and meteorological conditions all conspired to create one of the greatest sea-watching days ever. We're a bit tired of hearing about that day - and "St Ives is no good in anything other than a North West gale" - and, anyway, we've seen everything that was seen back then ... and more! So, we're not going to mention it ever again ... so please don't ....
The Island at St Ives is not actually an island, ie surrounded by water. Many years ago it was - with a hermit living on it - but those days are long gone. Back in the 1800's sometime, the gap between the Island and St Ives was filled in with sand by a storm and then by some clever engineering for its day, they then built upon that sand to create a permanent link.
The best time of year for seabords is traditionally late summer but we have proven that The Island really does produce good birds any time between July through to November as long as the wind has some West in it. However, let's be honest, the best time for seabirds is in a North West blow, especially if that North West has switched quickly overnight from a South West blow. The SW wind moves the birds into the Celtic Sea - the NW then ensures the birds get pushed into St Ives Bay and have to struggle past The Island to get out.
At peak passage season we get Wilson's, Leach's, Sabine's, all the Skuas including Long-tailed, as well as plenty of Cory's and a few Great Shearwaters. St Ives has also produced South Polar Skua and Black-browed Albatross and we had a Brown Booby in the bay for a couple of weeks - all in the last 5 years. The Island doesn't get the numbers of birds that Pendeen does, which is around 10km west of here, but we do get them passing MUCH closer.
Clodgy Point Coastal Path & Burthallen Lane
Clodgy Point is the next headland along from Man Head which is the one along from The Island. A walk out to Clodgy has delivered migrant birds like Wryneck, Whinchat and others - its an area that really should be watched more in spring and autumn... which is exactly what we'll be doing in 2026. Walk inland and it takes you through the Burthallen Loop - through a mix of scrub, farmland, fields and gardens. This promises much but we've not had time to really see what this area can produce. We have high hopes for Spring and Autumn. Our predictions for here include Tawny Pipit, Woodlark, Citrine Wagtail as well as more "common" species too.
Buttermilk Hill & Treveal Valley
Buttermilk (Rosewall) Hill is one of the highest points in the St Ives area. Regular birds here include Ring Ouzels, Cuckoo, Wheatears. Irregular birds have included Little Swift and Crag Martin in the recent past. Treveal is a NT location just down from Buttermilk and has hosted Yellow-browed Warbler, Golden Oriole, Melodious Warbler amongst other such rarities. Needless to say none of us have actually seen many of these rarities and they were seen quite a long time ago. But that doesn't stop us trying and given that Treveal is a valley, it's in West Cornwall, and those 2 things alone are enough to send birders quiver with excitement in autumn, and to a lesser extent, in spring. Buttermilk is Cornish farm and heathland with Western and European Gorse. Treveal is farmland and then remnant "Atlantic rain forest". The habitat promises much, but is hard to "work" precisly because it has so much cover. Both these locations are walkable from St Ives but need a well planned day trip to do both well.
Bussow Reservoir
Bussow Reservoir is a small, but substantial, bit of water that lies above St Ives. It is 10 acres in size and was created by damming the Bussow Stream a few good years ago. This little patch of water lies within the western most tip of the UK; it's the only standing freshwater for many miles; it's a couple of kilometres from the coast; and it has a decent list of rare birds: Spotted Sandpiper, Ring-necked Duck and ... our only Gadwall record back in 1984. That Gadwall record really shows how little this little reservoir has been watched. It is man-made and so has concrete or granite sides and so it doesn't have sloping, muddy fringes to attract passing waders. Basically, it's not as great as it could be. However, it is the only "lake" we have and that's good enough. And, quite honestly, we need to up our game here. We know we have missed loads of birds here - a Goosander dropped in for 2 minutes in March '26 and then left. We reckon that a lot of Yank waders and ducks have done in the past and will continue to do in the future ...
Zennor Head to Foage Valley
Zennor is the next village along from St Ives heading West. It, and the Foage Valley forms the western edge of our St Ives 20K patch and is the realm of James. Mysterious things happen this far West and we rely on James to make sense of it all. It's here that farmers find outlandishly rare birds from their tractors and where "one-day" birds are the norm. James has written a quick introduction to Zennor and Foage here. Again, it's a headland, it's a well-vegetated valley, it's in West Cornwall - what's not to like and get excited about!
Nance Lakes
Nance Lakes are located round the back of St Ives towards Trink Dairy. They're called fishing lakes because we assume people can fish in them. We've never seen people fish there - but that maybe because we haven't been there very much. As you can see from the photos its a lovely looking place with surrounding classic west cornish landscape and a decent bit of eutrophic water with surrounding vegation and grassy side ....... We'll be honest - the only reason that Nance Lakes are included is because they may, possibly, every now and then, occasionally, have a COOT swimming on them!!
