This is terrible news, heart breaking.
I have noticed in the last few months that the smaller birds are not around anymore.
I live in the countryside with trees all around me, i was always woken by the dawn chorus but now it seems you would be hard pressed even to hear a bird in the garden anymore.
I have tried to entice the birds back by making my garden more bird friendly, apart from collared doves which live in my trees i have seen only a few sparrows and one bluetit now for several weeks.
Even my territorial blackbird has gone, we use to get Jays, chaffinche's,and wrens, they have all gone.
Also another problem that has attacked the common garden is man himself, to be trendy a lot of the gardens have now been paved, decked to bring the garden in to the home so to speak.
Also people chop back hedges today to turn there gardens into car ports, the sheer amount of cars on the roads have meant that people have to park their vehicles in front of there homes and not on roads.
