Record for blackwinged stilt chicks

A record-breaking 13 black-winged stilt chicks have fledged in the UK this year in sites across Kent, Norfolk and Cambridgeshire.

Extremely rare in this country, more stilts have fledged in 2017 than the total number between 1983 and 2016.

The success follows years of conservation work in which the RSPB has sought to create ideal marshy habitats for the birds to raise their young. Nine of those recorded were spotted on two RSPB reserves – Cliffe Pools in north Kent and Ouse Washes in Cambridgeshire.

Elegant black and white waders with long, bubblegum pink legs, the black-winged stilts are usually found in southern Europe but, in part due to climate change, they have recently become a more common sight in the UK as they search for wetland in which to nest. There has been only a handful of successes in the past decade. Samantha Herbert