Litter Picker

Vole eats picker.

Two latrines.

Essential to any voling kit is some sort of long stick - it will help you climb up and down steep banks, and part grass so you can look for trackways and burrows. Lots of people use broom handles for the purpose because they're sturdy, but I like a litter picker because I can use it to pick up small pieces of vegetation to check for vole-cut ends, or to pluck grass out of the line of my camera's vision.

Today I used it to deposit a small piece of apple on a sandbank, then laid it next to me on the grass. Within twenty minutes a water vole pushed its nose out of a burrow right by the litter picker's business end, and proceeded to bite the plastic prongs. Then it optimistically tried to drag the picker into the burrow. I can only assume this is because it could smell the apple still.

I've had water voles try and take my bag in the past, but never one quite so ambitious in its thievery.

Eagle-eyes

Above, an active burrow at Steel Heath.

This is often what you have to fight through!

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Below, water vole droppings at the Country Park. (Click to enlarge, if necessary.)

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You do need usually to get right down close to the bank if you're going to spot water vole signs. This time of year that means wearing thick trousers, waterproof boots, full-length sleeves and stout gloves. Carrying a stick to part the tall reeds, and dousing yourself in insect repellent's a must: a pair of gardening shears or sharp scissors doesn't go amiss, either. What you're looking for is droppings less than the length of a 1p coin, that are the same colour as the mud they're sitting on - you really do need sharp eyes. Any vegetation you push aside MUST be put back to cover the bank back up and protect the voles.

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Anyway, in summary, there are burrows and feeding at Steel Heath, and droppings and feeding in Whitchurch Country Park.

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Cromford Treat

I've been too poorly to get out for the last couple of days - an insect bite to the inside of my eyelid, somehow, and a fairly violent allergic reaction has had me hiding indoors so as not to frighten small children. But in the meantime John Harding's sent these wonderful photographs taken at the Cromford Canal. They'd cheer anyone up, wouldn't they?

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Anyway, thought for the day is insect repellent. Don't go voling without it!

A Voling Kit

I thought I'd put together a list of kit I've found useful over the last three years for doing surveying work and checking mink rafts. Apologies if some of these seem self-evident, but there didn't seem any point in making an equipment list unless it was fairly comprehensive. So here are some of the items I take with me when I go voling:
* wellies/waders

* camera

* gloves to protect from scratches and germs (can be latex gloves if gardening ones make you too clumsy)

* gadget for scale - coin attached to a length of fishing twine wound round a cork

* pole/stick/grabber - useful for helping you balance as you scramble up and down banks, or test the depth of mud before you step into water

* little bag or pot for putting interesting samples in, eg pieces of feeding

* bottle of clean water for smoothing out the clay tracking compartment on the mink raft

* ruler for smoothing out clay, plus to help with scale in photographs

* ID book to help with tracks and scat etc - my favourite's Rob Strachan's Mammal Detective

You might also take along a phone, spare camera battery, sterile hand wipes or alcohol-based hand cleanser, binoculars/scope (though the zoom on a camera works quite well for this purpose), handheld GPS tracker for grid references, a sketch map and pencil on a clipboard (essential for proper survey recording).

If anyone has any other suggestions, do add them.

I include a recent photo from White Lion Meadow of feeding. I've spotted a suspicious-looking hole with spoil outside it; water voles dig inwards and don't leave spoil heaps outside their burrows, so I'm concerned this may be a rat.