Herdsman Lake 5th Jan 2020: Hunt for the Little Bittern

News had filtered out that a pair of Australian Little Bitterns (Black-backed Bittern) had bred at Herdsman Lake. Whilst the species isn't rare, it is usually very difficult to see due to it's secretive nature amongst it's favoured dense vegetation. I drove down to the lake and arrived at 5:15am and began searching for the bird. I had a rough idea where to look but in the semi-darkness it was no easy task. After about 45 minutes, I spotted some movement in the typha (reeds) and sure enough a juvenile Little Bittern came creeping out. It stood looking at the open water for about 5 minutes and then decided it wasn't in the mood for fishing and promptly disappeared back into the vegetation and didn't come out again (well at least for the further hour I waited there).

Australian Little Bittern

Having seen the target species, I decided to spend a bit more time birding to southern end of the lake and was rewarded with excellent views of both Freckled Duck and Nankeen Night-heron.

Freckled Duck

Nankeen Night-heron

My ebird list