The Country Park in February

Exposed water vole burrows in the bank

Otter spraint

Water vole prints

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The sides of the stream are looking very bare, but there's a lot of mammal activity in the park. Fresh mole hills, lots of rabbit droppings and fox scat, plus these water vole footprints and the usual otter spraint under the bridge. You could see burrows in the bank sides, too.

Management of watercourse banks: what do water voles need from councils?

Some notes by Malcolm Monie of the Whitchurch Water Vole Group:

Ground vegetation
When to cut?

• Ideally August or September. This allows some regrowth before winter

• Do not cut the same bit more than once in two years. Water voles like to use semi-permanent runs in the vegetation.

(Note: Environmental Stewardship Entry Level option EB6 allows cutting mid Sep - Feb)

Where and how to cut?

• Cut one bank only or if other bank unsuitable for water voles cut 20m, leave 20m uncut.

• Leave a 10-15 cm height of vegetation to provide some cover

• Leave 30-50 cm margin along water’s edge uncut to provide cover for water voles to move along the edge of the watercourse

• Operate machinery from top of bank to avoid trampling burrows which are nost vulnerable near the water’s edge.

Note: Close-mown vegetation should ideally be 3-5m and certainly no closer than 2-3m from the ditch or 1m from the top of the bank. Herbicides should not be used within this zone adjacent to a watercourse.

Overhanging branches and shrubs
Too much shade will prevent the growth of suitable ground plants to provide watervoles with the food and cover that they need. The animals will move through such areas but cannot feed or breed there. The removal of low overhanging branches and dense shrubs or scrub is beneficial.

Scant signs

Buzzard in the trees next to Grocontinental.

Water vole latrine

Checked out the fields near my house and, barring this single latrine, there are as yet very few signs of water voles. I don't doubt they're there, though.

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Developers and councils please take note: if you commission, or accept the findings of, an environmental survey scheduled during the winter months, it's not worth the paper it's written on.

Fieldfares and extra mice

Brown Moss Nature Reserve, completely frozen over.



On the advice of BBC2's 'Snow Watch' I put on the lawn some apple alongside the sunflower hearts and fat balls, and straight away attracted a fieldfare. I've never ever seen these in the garden before.
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Update: blimey, they're aggressive. Chris Packham didn't mention that! This one's strutting round with its tail up, diving furiously at anything that comes near. The blackbirds don't know what's hit them.

Meanwhile, in the greenhouse

New camera! I had a lot of bother with glare initially, till I taped a sheet of toilet paper over the lights. If anyone has any tips on how to get the best out of stealth trail cameras, let me know. This wood mouse has been living in the greenhouse for months, so I anticipate filming him quite a bit more.

Some Winter Activity

In my experience it's very unusual to find many water vole signs over the winter months, but here are some I came across on a walk this afternoon. Plenty of field vole presence, too.

Grey Squirrel Dancing

This is the tail-end of a mad ten minutes, where a grey squirrel went bananas up and down our compost heap and in and out of the mahonia. I've seen stoats dance in this way, but never squirrels. At this time of year, when there must be a need to conserve energy, I wonder why it dashed about so much? Unless it was to keep warm.