The assemblage of breeding birds of Worth Forest includes two large raptors that depend upon the extensive and un-fragmented character of its forest cover. These are the Honey Buzzard and Goshawk.
Goshawk is easily seen and heard across the whole Forest. Honey Buzzard is rarer and more discrete, and, as a summer resident, it migrates south in winter. Both birds are shy of disturbance and use the most infrequently visited parts of the Forest for breeding.
Hobby, another summer resident, is frequently seen. Peregrine and Sparrowhawk, Buzzard, Red Kite, and Kestrel are frequent. Tawny Owl is frequently heard and often seen, and Barn Owl is seen (e.g. Greentrees). Raven is often heard and frequently seen.
Woodcock breeds in numbers in Worth Forest, and the Forest has been called a "Woodcock hotspot". Woodcock is a woodland wader that has drastically declined in our Wealden countryside as a breeding bird, and the three almost contiguous forests of Worth, Ashdown and St Leonard's are important redoubts for them. Rodingvii birds are present in numbers across Oldhouse Warren, Greentrees, Worthlodge and Brantridge Forests. Goshawk has been seen to attack roding Woodcock, and it is likely that other raptors do too, such as Hobby. Nightjar is a summer resident in High Beeches and Brantridge Forests, Balcombe Down and Oldhouse Warren. It has been present too in Tilgate Forest. Both Woodcock and Nightjar are ground nesters and therefore require freedom from disturbance in the breeding season.
The rough and structurally diverse nature of Worth Forest's vegetation enables the rare Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, Redstart, and Spotted Flycatcher to retain small breeding groups in Worth Forest. In similar, but semi-open areas, particularly with Silver Birch, Willow Warblers breed (as in High Beeches, Brantridge, Monks and Worthlodge Forests, Balcombe Down and Oldhouse Warren). Grasshopper Warbler was heard in Oldhouse Warren in 2022. A variety of Tits are present in numbers - Marsh and Coal Tits, Long Tailed Tits, Great and Blue Tits, often seen with Nuthatch. Firecrest breeds in good numbers. Tree Pipit is occasionally seen and heard. Grey Wagtail breeds on the three branches of Stanford Brook.
Cuckoo is still present.
In winter Golden Plover appear on the Parish Lane ploughland. In winter, too, when there are many more over-wintering Woodcock, they fly out from the Forest's cover at dusk, and drop onto the fields to forage. Woodlark use these open areas too, such as Whiteley Hill. Brambling feeds in winter finch flocks, and Siskin, Crossbill and Lesser Redpoll are frequently heard and seen in mixed parties in the canopy, widely across the Forest, particularly where it is conifer dominated.