London Wetland Centre – the capital’s branch of the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust. A regular haunt, just a train ride away in Barnes. Today’s visit has an added frisson. Someone has seen a bittern, and I want a piece of the action. Some people will travel countrywide for a glimpse of a rare bird’s backside. I won’t, but will happily make a short trip across town for this most charismatic bird.
Not that the sighting’s guaranteed. Bitterns are secretive birds, fond of skulking in reedbeds, their streaky brown plumage the most effective camouflage. Factor in their relative scarcity, and any encounter is to be treasured.
Bitterns have a weird, alien quality. Streaky tubes of awkwardness, prowling through the reeds, head forward, thick neck slung low. In the right place, in breeding season, you might hear one. Their far-carrying boom – like someone blowing across the top of a milk bottle – is the deepest British bird sound. Unlike other birdsong, it’s produced by the expulsion of air through the oesophagus. Get close enough and you’ll hear clicks and wheezes as it inflates the bellows before burping out the call. Hooomb – hooomb – hooomb.
Once regarded as an ill omen, that haunting sound is a boon for modern birders. The bittern’s recovery from 19th-century near-extinction was slow, but recent restoration of reedbeds has boosted their population. And each winter, one or two choose this wetland reserve as their temporary home. A bird of the fens in the heart of London’s urban sprawl. Crazy.
The hide is empty. Tranquillity seeps into my bones. A Cetti’s warbler shouts from deep in the reeds. A cormorant perches on a post – beaky, prehistoric, strangely noble. On the island, 30 lapwings stand stoic, buffeted by the wind. Starlings scurry among them, Flash Harrys in shiny suits. Gulls, geese, ducks. No bittern.
The lapwings, spooked, fly up in a flurry. They swing round in a loose, coordinated flock, accompanied by the starlings. Sweeping low over the water, they jink to the left as if dodging a tackle. The unanimity of it is breathtaking, group telepathy at work. Nimble, elegant and mesmerising, an aerial ballet of the highest order. Enough to take me out of myself, and away from the cares of the world. I almost – almost – forget about the bittern.
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