land area is heavily forested and 4.0% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 37.4% is used for growing crops and 23.1% is pastures and 1.7% is used for alpine pastures. The former municipality is located on the Plateau de Diesse. It consists of the village of Prêles and the hamlet of Châtillon. On 31 December 2009 District de la Neuveville, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Arrondissement administratif Jura bernois. Coat of arms The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Or a Cauldron Sable. The cauldron refers to the local pitch industry which has largely vanished. Demographics Prêles had a population (as of 2011) of 908. , 8.8% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2001-2011) the population has changed at a rate of 0.1%. Migration accounted for 0.1%, while births and deaths accounted for 0.6%. Most of the population () speaks French (580 or 65.5%) as their first language, German is the second most common (270 or 30.5%) and Italian is the third (8 or 0.9%). , the population was 49.6% male and 50.4% female. The population was made up of 409 Swiss men (45.1% of the population) and 41 (4.5%) non-Swiss men. There were 418 Swiss women (46.1%) and 39 (4.3%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 214 or about 24.2% were born in Prêles and lived there in 2000. There were 317 or 35.8% who were born in the same canton, while 219 or 24.7% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 104 or 11.7% were born outside of Switzerland. , children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 22.2% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 56.8% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 20.9%. , there were 359 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 440 married individuals, 50 widows or widowers and 37 individuals who are divorced. , there were 85 households that consist of only one person and 24 households with five or more people. , a total of 320 apartments (80.8% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 58 apartments (14.6%) were seasonally occupied and 18 apartments (4.5%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 7.7 new units per 1000 residents.