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Zitting Cisticolas Raised at Least Seven Juveniles from Three Broods in Suffolk

Zitting Cisticola in grass at Thrithala, Kerala, India
Conservation · Population & status

At least seven young Zitting Cisticolas (Cisticola juncidis) from three broods were present at Corporation Marsh near Walberswick in Suffolk by 6 August 2026. The Suffolk Coast National Nature Reserve team reported at least 11 birds in total, including up to three singing males. The breeding success marked the species’ second consecutive successful breeding year on mainland Britain.

The birds ranged south towards Little Dingle and inland towards the old wind pump. Because the breeding birds were attracting visitors, the reserve team asked observers to remain on footpaths and boardwalks and stay out of fenced areas.

Three broods followed mainland Britain’s first successful breeding in 2025

Zitting Cisticola bred successfully at the same Suffolk site in 2025, when adults were seen carrying food to recently fledged young and four juveniles were eventually confirmed. That was the first proven successful breeding on mainland Britain. The 2026 record went further, with juveniles from at least three broods and a larger group of birds present at the site.

An earlier nesting record in the wider British Isles occurred on Guernsey in 2009. The Suffolk records therefore mark a very recent change in the species’ status on the British mainland rather than its first breeding anywhere in the British Isles.

Sources and image credit

  1. NE Suffolk Coast National Nature Reserve team. (2026, August 6). Zitting Cisticola breeds again in 2026 [reserve-team announcement reproduced by Suffolk Bird Group].Primary reserve-team announcement of renewed breeding success. The announcement reported at least 11 Zitting Cisticolas at Corporation Marsh as of 6 August, including up to three singing males and at least seven juveniles from three broods. Suffolk Bird Group reproduces the announcement on its August sightings page.
  2. Rare Bird Alert. (2026, August 7). Zitting Cisticolas breed in Suffolk for second year running.Supporting contemporary report confirming that Natural England's Suffolk coast NNR team announced the breeding success on 6 August 2026 and providing context on the 2025 breeding season.
  3. British Birds. (2026, August 28). Zitting Cisticola breeds again in Britain.Supporting account confirming the 2026 status at Corporation Marsh and placing it in context as the second consecutive successful breeding year on mainland Britain.

Image: Zitting Cisticola photographed at Thrithala, Palakkad, Kerala, India, 8 January 2023. Photo: Shino jacob koottanad / Wikimedia Commons. Representative species image; not one of the Suffolk breeding birds. · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source

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