Among the egrets, bitterns and cranes on Somerset’s Avalon Marshes, it would be easy to ignore a rather stocky diving duck, with a pale grey body, black breast and tail, and rich chestnut head. As I scan the reedbeds, I often see pochards flying fast and low, before vanishing into thick vegetation below.
Yet from a British point of view, of all the birds breeding here, the pochard is one of the rarest. Just 700 pairs nest annually in the UK, and the flagship RSPB reserve at Ham Wall is one of their main strongholds.
