No bird flu reported in Arctic tern colony

There were no confirmed cases of bird flu at Long Nanny

Rangers are delighted after finding no confirmed cases of bird flu in Britain's largest mainland colony of Arctic terns.

Last year, about 1,000 chicks died from the disease at Long Nanny on the Northumberland coast.

National Trust area ranger James Porteus said in the midst of tern breeding season staff were "on tenterhooks to see if the chicks survive" this year.

But he said the team could now confirm they had found no cases of bird flu at all on the site in 2024. "It's slightly unthinkable that we would go from so many birds dying last year to nothing this year," he said.

This year, the team counted about 1,080 breeding pairs of Arctic terns and 400 fledglings.

But he said the true number of fledglings was probably more than one thousand, as it was "so difficult to count them".

"Given how many birds died last year and... that we don't know how many more may have died out at sea, the fact we had over a thousand breeding pairs coming back this year was really positive," he said.

Baby Arctic terns appeared to be the most susceptible to bird flu last year, which was why the team were so nervous about what would happen to this year's batch, said Mr Porteus.

Assuming bird flu did not return to the bird population in Northumberland for the next few years, last year's poor Arctic tern chick survival rate was unlikely to affect long-term population numbers, he said.

This year's fledglings are likely to spend the next month or so at Long Nanny, before they migrate for about a month to South Africa and then to Antarctica, before their return to Northumberland.