Kestrel populations have declined significantly in the UK, with individual welfare threatened by changes in agricultural practice that have reduced prey availability and nesting sites.
Kestrel welfare at population level is shaped by food availability and nesting opportunity. Individual kestrels experience welfare impacts through starvation when prey declines, secondary rodenticide poisoning causing neurological effects, and nest failure from disturbance. Field margins and rough grassland areas are critical habitat providing the vole populations that sustain kestrel welfare. Agricultural policy that rewards farmers for maintaining rough margins protects kestrel welfare at landscape scale.