Relationships between patterns of habitat cover and the historical distribution of the Marsh Tit, Willow Tit and Lesser Spotted Woodpecker in Britain

► We used bird atlas and land cover data to investigate bird/habitat distributions. ► We compared habitat cover where bird distribution had changed or remained constant. ► Birds persisted where habitat cover was greatest, not where it was relatively low. ► Simple spatial analyses were successful for data exploration. ► Availability of repeat datasets can facilitate future studies of greater detail.