Latin name - Acrocephalus scirpaceus

A very plain warbler, the Reed Warbler can often be difficult to see as it sings from within often dense reed beds. It is also hard to distinguish from some of the other warblers so I hope our identification (mainly based on its location in the reed beds of Slapton Ley) is correct! It is a summer visitor, breeding in reed beds mainly in East Anglia and along the south coast of England, also in Wales but rarer in Scotland and Ireland. It stays from April to October before migrating to its winter quarters in Africa. Its diet consists mainly of insects although it takes berries in the autumn. Its nest, which consists of a nest basket built around reed stems, is often exploited by the Cuckoo for its notorious habit of laying an egg in other birds nest.