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  Profile

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  In flight

Songbirds

Aquatic Warbler

Acrocephalus paludicola

• rare
• 55 km/h
• Vulnerable

Europe's rarest migratory songbird. Breeds in sedge fens that are vanishing year by year.

Population

18,000-29,000 mature individuals (decreasing)

Habitat

Large open lowland sedge fen mires and similarly structured marshy/wet grassland habitats with shallow standing water (1-10 cm deep) and vegetation typically shorter than 30 cm

Fun fact

The Aquatic Warbler is Europe's rarest migratory passerine and one of the most promiscuous songbirds known, with most males and females siring or rearing offspring with multiple partners in the same brood.

Range

Breeds in scattered fen sites in central/eastern Europe and western Asia, with roughly 99% of the population in Poland, Belarus, and Ukraine (Polesie region); migrates through western Europe and winters in the Sahelian belt of West Africa, notably wetlands along the Senegal and Niger rivers (e.g. Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary, Senegal)

Diet

Insectivorous; feeds mainly on small arthropods such as spiders, dragonflies, grasshoppers, and beetles, occasionally taking berries and other small food items

Size

0.13 m

Lifespan

9.6 years