Following recent excitement over
the arrival of rare
herons to the site, RSPB Burton Mere Wetlands is now celebrating further,
with confirmed breeding of Bearded Tits for the first time ever at the nature
reserve near Neston.
Bearded Tits rely on reedbeds to
make their home. Once much more common throughout the UK, reedbeds are sadly
now one of country’s rarest habitats as many have been drained for development
or agriculture. In the North West, the only place where they have traditionally
bred is at the RSPB’s Leighton Moss reserve in North Lancashire, but following
the arrival of six birds to Burton Mere Wetlands last autumn, at least two
pairs are now known to have bred for the first time on the Dee Estuary.
Graham Jones, Site Manager at Burton
Mere Wetlands said: ‘In 2007 we were able to purchase land adjacent to our
reserve from the Welsh Assembly. A three-year work programme began almost
immediately to create a reedbed, into which volunteers’ hand-planted over
10,000 reed seedlings. To have Bearded Tits now breeding in the very same
reedbed this summer has been a wonderfully fitting culmination of all that hard
work, and a fantastic way celebrate our 40th anniversary”
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