Booming marvellous: welcome increase for bittern

On the verge of extinction 12 years ago, bitterns this year have enjoyed their best year for at least 120 years. Bittern wading in reedbed Photo: Andy Hay/rspb-images.comResearch by Natural England and the RSPB reveals that the bittern, one of the UK’s most threatened birds, has enjoyed its best ever year for at least 120 years, continuing this formerly extinct British bird’s dramatic recovery.

The 2009 survey found that the number of calling male bitterns had increased from 75 last year, also a record year, to a record minimum of 82 this year. The number of wetland sites with booming males across the UK has also increased from 41 to 43 this year.

The bittern, a relative of the grey heron, is confined in Britain to tracts of extensive reedbed, especially sections of East Anglia, pockets of northern England and, more recently, the Somerset Levels and Moors.

Concerted effort

Dr Tom Tew, Chief Scientist for Natural England, said: “Extinct by 1886, the bittern only returned in the early twentieth century, coming near to extinction again in the mid 1990s. Since then, concerted efforts by the conservation community to restore dry reedbeds and create new areas of wet reedbed have paid dividends, with the population now as large as it has ever been during the twentieth century.

“We look forward to future booms in numbers as we realise our joint Wetland Vision project which, with six million pound of funding from Natural England, has begun to create extensive areas of new wetlands.”

Dr Mark Avery, the RSPB’s conservation director, said: “When we feared the bittern would hit the buffers again, the conservation community rallied to its cause by managing or recreating extensive tracts of habitat. We didn’t believe at the time, that we’d see the bittern population bounce back to record levels in just 12 years.”

Since 1990, bittern researchers have estimated the UK bittern population by listening for the male bittern’s booming song, which the birds use to establish territories and attract females. The boom can be heard up to three kilometers or more away.

Researchers recorded a minimum of 82 booming males in the UK. The following regions held the greatest numbers of booming males: Suffolk coast (28); Norfolk Broads (19); and The Fens (12).