...(aka Bittern Galore!)
Friday afternoons are traditionally a bit of a house keeping day - tidying, litter picking and the like and consequently lack some of the romance and allure of active conservation management. However, as alluded to in an earlier blog, the mundane and the magical can and do occasionally meet and have the capacity to make the most humdrum task memorable as I hope the following will illustrate.
Opening the hide this morning I was desperately trying to string a cormorant as an otter (sadly I failed). Just as the bird surfaced with a large roach (too large to swallow it transpired) a bittern flew into the reeds and perched for a while before dropping down to begin foraging just 30 or so feet away. A woodcock then flew past which by and large added up to a very nice start to the day.
This afternoon while engaged in the less that stimulating task of litter picking on Lodmoor, Will and I had great flight views of another bittern for perhaps 30 seconds. Thereafter the litter paled by comparison.
A while later when cleaning the V.C. windows I was treated to a third bittern of the day which bizarrely flew quite high over Swannery Car Park, banked over King Street, over the station, KFC, McDonald’s, Comet et al before disappearing behind the trees of Radipole Park Drive. It was up for long enough to provide VC staff with decent views – but strangely rather inferior to those offered to diners in McDonald’s.
I can state without fear of contradiction that litter picking or window cleaning are not strong motivations for those wishing to pursue a career in conservation but they can bring little treasures and provide some welcome perspective.
Thanks Cookie.
Many factors at play including the extreme cold forcing more continental birds to us, added to the great breeding success of Ham Wall and surrounds in Somerset - 14 bittern nests in the Avalon Marshes is truly exceptional. Ham Wall was a peat extraction site until the mid-90's, when the RSPB took it on and 'made' a reedbed. Just two years ago it hosted the first successful bittern nest in the county for 40 years.
A colleague at RSPB Marazion Marsh tells me that they have 6/7 bittern down there (about the same as us I reckon) and Ham Wall at least 9 wintering birds so all our reedbed sites in the south west are doing well.
Pleasingly the Bittern are using ditches restored and re-profiled just months ago which can be viewed as a positive sign for the future.
Hi Nick
I too have just an exquisite moment with a bittern – he landed a few metres away from the left hand windows of the hide and proceeded to do his sky pointing thing, then crouching, then pointing and moving his head from side to side. A few minutes later, a second bird, I think, flew over and judging from comments from other people, there were at least three if not four birds seen on Sunday! I’m sure there are other factors and variables at play too but I can’t help thinking that the WW team have done something very right in the restoration of the reserve to produce such a flurry of bittern activity. Well done! I have only one complaint – at the same time as the bittern, I was watching a marsh harrier preen herself on a post on the other side of the pool and a jack snipe pootling in the mud at the base of the hide. One at a time please!
You are welcome to give it a try Frank - we provide instruction... best that I don't mention the two further bittern sightings I had locking up the hide last night then. Ooops!
Some people get all the luck, no one's asked me to pick litter!!
Isn't that the stuffed Bittern you had in the office the other day!?
Seize the day!