Bittern Once again I rearranged my day off work so I could make a weekday visit to Slimbridge as the Bittern had been showing on a regular basis for the last week.

This time on arrival we headed straight for the Zeiss hide where most of the Bittern sightings were from. A quick glance through the windows and both Rob and I spotted the Bittern about 40-50m away but as the light was very good we still managed quite respectable shots. After a short while the bird started to slowly make its way to our right and then slowly came closer to us, occasionally it would stop and catch something from the water although far too small for us to see what it was.

The Bittern spent four hours in full view although most of the times there were reeds crossing his face, beak or body so photography still wasnt easy. When the Bird finally settled down deep in amongst the reeds we decided to go, however we were on our way out of the hide when we spotted a 2nd Bittern even closer to us (probably been there all morning but their camouflage is so good we had not seen it before). This bird was considerably closer although only stayed in view for about ten minutes before finally being lost in amongst the dense reeds.

After quite a few visits to Slimbridge and many many hours in the hide we finally had a day to remember....first finding the Bittern on our arrival and then numerous photo opportunities and finally to see a 2nd bird on the site. Certainly a day to remember!!