A Sad Goodbye - a Colony Wiped Out by Mink

The wildlife photographer Richard Steel http://wildlifephotographic.blogspot.co.uk/ has been following a colony of water voles at Acton, Cheshire, and taking the most wonderful photographs like the ones above. But he contacted me a few days ago to say that all the water voles are now gone. He was worried at the end of last year about the presence of mink, and sure enough, this year the colony had been wiped out. He'd found mink scat, and seen a dead moorhen in the water. Tellingly, there were no ducklings on that stretch of canal either. Acton Marina had been home to a strong and busy population of animals, but now there's nothing left at all.

It is so important that we trap and kill mink when we know they're about. To do nothing is to walk away whistling from a man-made ecological disaster, and to sign the water voles' death warrant. All we can do from this incident is learn a lesson.

You can see more of Richard's heartbreakingly beautiful photographs here: http://wildlifephotographic.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=vole

Acton again

Edgeley Road vole

On the canal at Acton. Below, a vole hole chewed in the mesh that's been installed against the bank.

Checked out the colony on the canal near Acton again this morning with some wildlife photographer friends. Quite a few sightings but not many photos as, for my camera, the voles were too far away. This evening, however, I went down to the field and the place was full of voles, including this small one investigating my litter picker.

Meanwhile, across the County Border

After a bit of willow.

Swimming off with a willow leaf

Adult seeing off a juvenile

Above-ground water vole nest (we think)

Latrine underneath a bridge

Ducklings are a good sign that mink aren't about

Brilliant morning surveying the canal near Acton Marina, Nantwich, with the team from Cheshire Wildlife Trust. This survey was unusual in that we couldn't access the bank we were investigating at all, so it had to be done remotely, through binoculars. However we did make out burrows, floating bits of feeding, a lawn and at least six actual voles so there was no doubt about positive presence! We're also pretty sure we could see a water vole nest, which is something special (normally nests, woven from lengths of folded grass, are underground in chambers leading off burrows). Lastly, under one of the bridges we saw otter spraint. I've found spraint on the Weaver, which isn't too far away, so I wasn't surprised.

There are a few issues with habitat here: a lot of the canal sides are stone or concrete or metal piling, unusable for a burrowing animal. However, there are enough stretches where the bank is held secure with a kind of mesh, and that seems to suit the voles just fine. They go under it and over it and push it down and gnaw holes in the material. They also use the cracks in between the bigger stones. And fortunately the fields behind are fenced off with a good margin of untouched cover, so their bank is virtually undisturbed. Though there is a lot of boat-traffic, that doesn't bother the voles at all and we were able to watch them without any difficulty.