Willow Warblers in the North West (1 Viewer)

On another thread someone mentioned how many Willow Warblers they saw or heard on a trip up north and compared it with the apparent decrease in the south.
On my travels around my local patches I've heard as many in recent years as I did in the past. On a Spring walk I counted 51 which was pretty good considering there's no suitable habitat for them on around 40% of the circuit.
The latest published Cumbria Bird report[2017] would seem to confirm this anecdotal evidence.
It quotes the BBS trend: 1995-2016 UK -9%. North West England +5%.

I was on holiday around the Grasmere area a few weeks back and have to concur. There seemed to be lots of them around. Considering the fact that they were not singing (it was July) I was surprised at how many I saw. Obviously numbers would have been swollen with young birds but it did strike me that there seemed to be a lot of them compared to back home in Leicester.