Today we took delivery of 10 dormouse nest tubes kindly donated by the Sussex Wildlife Trust. We've started attaching some of them to level branches at about chest height, among the beech trees in the birch side of the wood. Dormice are said to favour hazel coppice. There is a small area of 'overstood' hazel coppice in the wood neglected for many years, where we'll install some tubes and hope a dormouse finds them.
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| Badly neglected hazel coppice. Another important job to tackle. |
However, surveys have shown that dormice are more adaptable than previously thought, and have been found nesting in a wide variety of habitats, even in gardens and conifer plantations. So we hope to be lucky and find evidence of these charming, but rare and elusive little creatures. The nesting tubes are of a very simple construction, so we'll be making some more to provide as many convenient homes as possible for any stray dormice.The tubes must be checked every month or so for evidence of use. If there is food in the tube then it is likely to be a wood mouse rather than a dormouse. Ditto, dead leaves - dormice only use fresh green leaves in their nests. As for droppings, we're not at all sure if we could tell what sort of mouse they belong to. So, it's not going to be easy to find firm evidence of their presence in Old Copse.
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| Dormouse nest tube (library picture) |
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Dormouse nest (library picture)
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