Showing posts with label hedgerows. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hedgerows. Show all posts

Friday, 15 March 2024

Hedgerows

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Monday, 13 February 2023

HS2 got its nature figures wrong, new report reveals

HS2 – already plagued with issues – has, according to The Wildlife Trusts, underestimated its impact on habitats and wildlife. 


The charity is urging wildlife lovers to sign this open letter. They claim:
many well established tree-lined and species-rich hedgerows, which provide berries, shelter and nesting places for wildlife, have been given a lower nature value than the new hedgerows that HS2 Ltd is going to plant.
We shouldn’t be surprised. It was the same for Aggregate Industries’ plans for Straitgate Farm, where centuries-old 4m-wide biodiversity-rich hedgerows were valued at 39.92 units, less than their young sapling replacements at 43.19 units. 

Why did this matter at Straitgate? These units formed part of the Planning Inspectors’ decision:  
85. …there would be a 15% net gain in biodiversity… which would further weigh significantly in favour. 
Devon County Council’s ecology witness said it wasn't clear how these figures had been derived:  
5.7 Subsequent to biodiversity metric offsetting calculations provided in the July 2017 Regulation 22 Ecology Response, SLR submitted a recalculation of Biodiversity Net Gain using the Defra Metric 2.0 tool in January 2021 [CD4.51A] and returned an overall 18.07% increase in habitat units and 8.18% increase in hedgerow units. The report states that the scheme provides an overall net gain in biodiversity units of 15% but it is not clear how this figure has been arrived at based on the headline summary figures from the Metric 2.0 (habitats, hedgerows and riverine habitats are calculated separately). 
Maybe it was smoke and mirrors, maybe it was magic. Whatever it was, the approach of biodiversity net gain clearly trades wildlife losses today for uncertain future gains – with a huge number of mitigation commitments from developers failing to be delivered.  
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Sunday, 16 May 2021

We need to be preserving English oaks, not cutting them down

This oak tree is what Aggregate Industries’ consultants call T5. 


It is the smallest of the oak trees likely to be lost by a quarry at Straitgate Farm.

Aggregate Industries claims: "Three mature oak trees will be lost to the development, two of which grow within hedgerows and one located within a field". This ignores Trees F, G and H which are "likely [to] be damaged by the development and need to be felled." 

In all, six mature oaks are likely to be lost, as well as two substantial beech trees and other mature trees during site access works. Aggregate Industries’ consultants dismiss these trees as having “little impact on the amenity of the area”. 

What will replace them? In Aggregate Industries' alternative universe, the land of smoke and mirrors, the ripping out of 1.5km of ancient hedgerow up to 4m wide – habitat for protected dormice and bats – and the felling of 6 mature oak trees, replacing natural history hundreds of years old with saplings and tree tubes, will show a net biodiversity gain! It defies logic and common sense. 

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Thursday, 15 April 2021

Straitgate ancient hedgerows in bloom

Straitgate's hedgerows are hundreds of years old.
Aggregate Industries wants to grub many of them up, saying whatever it can to dismiss their importance. 

The company's wildlife assessments of Straitgate Farm are years out of date. Surveys of hedgerows, dormice, bats, birds, badgers, etc., were all performed back in 2013. Devon County Council requested an update, and last year a consultant working on behalf of Aggregate Industries had a bit of a walkabout. The independence of this ecologist is obviously questionable given this Freudian slip: 
Mike was accompanied by My Clive Tompkins of Aggregate Industries during the visit. 
But not only for that reason. On the subject of hedgerows, the ecologist reckoned "most have been recently flailed back hard." It was another fabrication, as the above photo taken this week confirms.
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Sunday, 21 February 2021

Hedgerows: ‘Reservoirs of life’ that can help the UK reach net zero

One New Year’s Day, ecologist Rob Wolton came up with an unusual resolution – to spend the next 12 months studying a hedge 40 metres from his house in the middle of Devon.
He wanted to make a list of every plant, animal and fungus that used it. 
“I thought it would take a year, but at the end of the first one I was still finding masses of new species so decided to carry on for another,” he says. 
That was 10 years ago. After two years of observations he had found 2,000 species – far more than he imagined. The hedge is 20 metres from a pond, 130 metres from a native broadleaf wood, and surrounded by nature-friendly farmland, which means it is probably particularly good for wildlife – Wolton estimates that the hedge supports nearer 3,000 species in total. 
“There is increasing recognition that within intensively farmed landscapes, much of the wildlife finds refuge in the hedges. But they’re much more than just wildlife corridors – they are really important as habitats in their own right,” he says.

But hedgerows are important for other reasons too. Not only do they sequester carbon, retain soil, alleviate flooding, improve air and water quality, they are also part of our cultural landscape, part of our history and national identity. 

Aggregate Industries couldn't care. The company wants to grub up some 1500m of ancient hedgerow at Straitgate Farm – hedgerows dating back hundreds of years, hedgerows up to 4 metres wide, hedgerows that are habitat for protected bats and dormice. 

What would Aggregate Industries replace them with? Here's an example of the company's recent work, courtesy of Devon County Council's recent Hillhead monitoring report. 

Is it any wonder we're in such serious trouble?
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Monday, 18 January 2021

Importance of hedgerows


So why are we still ripping out these precious and often ancient wildlife corridors?
The last hedgerow survey, in 2007, recorded 500,000km of hedgerow in the UK. Extending this by 40% would require the creation of 200,000km of new hedges across rural and urban landscapes – which equates to about half the length of Britain’s road network.
Why is this needed? 
Hedges sequester carbon both in woody growth above ground and in roots, leaf litter and other soil organic matter at and below ground level. In addition, hedges across slopes capture eroding soil and can increase soil organic carbon for up to 60m uphill. In contrast to some of the other forms of carbon capture proposed in the report, hedges are a low-risk way of capturing carbon and provide multiple benefits.
The CCC report also explains that an increase in hedges “results in benefits to biodiversity through habitat creation […]and can help towards flood alleviation”. Hedges regulate air and water quality through intercepting pollutants, maintain essential diversity, and are already an important cultural landscape feature.
This video also reminds us of the benefits that hedgerows bring:


And yet, we continue to lose hedgerow at an alarming rate. 

Aggregate Industries' plans to quarry Straitgate Farm propose to grub up nearly 1500m of 'important' hedgerow – hedgerows up to 4m wide – hedgerows dating back hundreds of years – hedgerows that provide up to 6000m2 of habitat for protected bats and dormice.

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Monday, 14 December 2020

Housebuilder fined £600k for destroying bat roost

A court has handed out the largest ever fine for wildlife crime to Bellway Homes after it admitted "carrying out work at a site where bats were known to inhabit". All species of bats in the UK are protected.
The company had been notified in planning documents that it would first need to obtain the appropriate mitigation and a Natural England European protected species licence.

Consultants found "at least eleven bat species" when they surveyed Straitgate Farm in 2013, including one of the rarest bats in western Europe. 

Little compensation planting has yet been established at Straitgate for protected bats and dormice. Much of the tree planting that took place in 2014 – in an effort to compensate for the ancient hedgerows and veteran trees that would be lost from quarrying – was in the wrong place and had to be cut down. 

The People’s Trust for Endangered Species has strongly objected to Aggregate Industries' application to quarry Straitgate Farm, saying: 
An extensive amount of important hedgerow will be destroyed. This is completely irreversible. The hedgerows are… likely to have existed for centuries… Compensation planting… for losses of irreplaceable habitat should be at a ratio in the region of 30 – 1. Proposed replanting and that already done falls far short of this.
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Wednesday, 15 April 2020

Hedgerows: ‘it's vital we take care of what we have left’


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Wednesday, 4 September 2019

The Great British Hedgerow Survey

Aggregate Industries' plans to quarry Straitgate Farm would see extensive distances of ancient hedgerows up to 4m wide grubbed up. Little compensation has been put in place to offer alternative habitat for bats and dormice.

An extensive amount of important hedgerow will be destroyed. This is completely irreversible. The hedgerows are present on maps dating from the turn of the 20th century (Appendix 1) and are likely to have existed for centuries before this. Compensation planting (for that is what replanting is – not mitigation as suggested) for losses of irreplaceable habitat should be at a ratio in the region of 30 – 1. Proposed replanting and that already done falls far short of this.
The PTES has recently been tweeting on the importance of hedgerows, and has started the Great British Hedgerow Survey:










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Wednesday, 17 October 2018

Cutting hedges next to roads is a standard but necessary chore for any landowner…

... who wants to stay on the right side of Section 154 of the Highways Act 1980.

So why are the hedgerows around the perimeter of Straitgate Farm proving so difficult for Aggregate Industries to cut back – in the interests of road safety?

This, of course, is at a time when AI should be doing all it can to convince people that it really could be a good neighbour to the local community – if the company’s controversial quarry plans, and all the associated harmful impacts, were to be dumped all over them.

The area on the right of the lane pictured below is AI's responsibility. Only last year, an ash tree was lost after AI delayed dealing with known issues.


The perimeter hedges around Straitgate are AI's responsibility. They have not been maintained for many years and are in desperate need of attention. AI has repeatedly been warned, this year and previous years, that for safety reasons the hedges need cutting back. Visibility is currently obscured for those exiting Birdcage Lane onto Exeter Road, and elsewhere.

Despite the warnings, at the time of writing no action, or even indication of action, has been forthcoming.

Perhaps posting here will spur AI into taking responsibility? Because if AI can’t even keep a few hedges cut back, what hope is there for the myriad of other more complex and onerous mitigation conditions it would have to adhere to at Straitgate, if its damaging quarry plans were given the go-ahead?
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Thursday, 6 September 2018

AI has been massaging figures again


We posted:
The company claims "The number of trees we plant is always rising". But it's always worth checking AI's claims. Because, if the company's sustainability reports are to be believed, AI planted 16,800 trees in 2013 (p21) and 3,400 in 2014 (p24).
So... not 4,500 in 2014, and not "always rising".
... at Straitgate, this is what's left of some of those 3,400 trees AI planted in 2014:


But not content with that, AI has done it again:


In 2015 we completed... 110 meters of hedging.
So again, the numbers do not keep growing.

And what AI fails to mention, of course, is the amount of ancient hedgerow that the company grubs up in the first place, and that the hedgerows the company plants are mere saplings – that will take decades to reach anywhere near what was removed.

At Straitgate Farm, for example, AI wants to remove nearly 1500m of 'important' hedgerow – hedgerows dating back hundreds of years – hedgerows that provide habitat for protected bats and dormice – hedgerows up to 4m wide.

So spare us the greenwash AI. Most people will still regard your business as primarily habitat destruction.

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Monday, 2 April 2018

AI cuts down ‘compensation’ planting; so where does that leave protected species?

Four years ago, Aggregate Industries planted some trees around Straitgate Farm in an effort to compensate for the ancient hedgerows and veteran trees that would be lost if quarrying took place. The trees were meant to provide replacement habitat for protected dormice. This is what they look like now:


They had previously looked like this:


We said at the time that the planting was presumptuous and 20 years too late. The area set aside for planting was also woefully inadequate.

As it turned out, AI failed to consult Exeter Airport on the issue, and planted the majority of these trees in the wrong place. In 2015, Exeter Airport advised:
Any tree and hedge planting should be restricted to the far eastern side of the site and below the 135mAOD contour ensuring trees are not allowed to grow to a height that will cause OLS penetration issues in future years.
Tree management and planting should be carried out following the guidance in the attached EDAL tree planting plan to ensure no further penetrations of the Obstacle limitation surfaces.


As a result, AI’s Reg22 Ecology Response admitted:
6,000 m2 (0.6 ha) of advance woodland planting within the application boundary will be removed due to issues relating to Exeter Airport. 2.1.5
However, if you look at the above plan you will see that Exeter Airport advised AI to remove only the trees in the red circle, and control the height of the remainder. Perversely, AI has chopped down ALL the trees and shrubs in both the red AND the orange areas.

It’s a shambles. If we can’t trust AI to do a simple job like managing tree planting in the right place, how can we trust it to dig in the right place, or more specifically for the protection of people’s water supplies, dig to the right depth? We digress.

Last year DCC’s Reg22 Request said:
The MPA must ensure that the application provides sufficient compensatory habitat for loss of species rich / ecologically valuable hedges and associated species. As a dormouse licence is required from NE [Natural England] we need to be sure that the three Habitats Regulations tests will be met and that it is likely that NE will issue a licence. Please can the applicant provide information to evidence that the favourable conservation test will be met and that they believe that NE will issue a licence.
In relation to the Habitats Regulations tests, AI’s consultants argued that:
With regard to Test 3 consideration of dormouse has taken place since 2014 with supplementary planting of new woodland and hedgerows. These have developed significantly since being planted, with the latter already suitable for dormice. It is likely the woodland will take a couple of years before it too will suitable for this species.
Well, as of last week, the majority of the supplementary planting of 2014 has gone. So, where does that now leave protected species, Test 3* and the likelihood of Natural England issuing a dormouse licence?

No doubt all will be cunningly explained in due course. AI has recently been planting some saplings, below 135m AOD, in an effort to make up for what has been and would be lost, but it will again be many years before these develop into anything useful.

Remember, this is the same company that wants to establish itself as "true advocates of biodiversity":
Quite simply, biodiversity matters to us. As part of our overall Sustainability Policy we were clear about how we wish to manage our impact on nature. We stated that we would "manage our land holdings so that biodiversity is protected and enhanced, where practicable, throughout our operations and is considered in our site restoration schemes." Never has this been more true.
Brilliant.

But if biodiversity mattered to AI, wouldn't it have come up with more than the derisory amount of established compensation planting so far offered for the loss of irreplaceable habitat for protected dormice and bats?

If biodiversity mattered to AI, why is Devon Wildlife Trust concerned that restoration proposals at Straitgate "will need many years to reach a state in which they can perform a meaningful part of the ecological network of this area"?

If biodiversity mattered to AI, why has the People's Trust for Endangered Species objected to the Straitgate application, reminding us that "Compensation planting... for losses of irreplaceable habitat should be at a ratio in the region of 30 – 1"?

Quite simply, AI talks big but has failed to deliver anything close to the required amount of compensation planting. Quite simply, AI has had years to get this planting in place. Quite simply, "if your actions do not prove the truth of your words, then your words are nothing more than lies" - as the famous saying goes.


* Natural England Guidance Note: "the action authorised will not be detrimental to the maintenance of the population of the species concerned at a favourable conservation status in their natural range"19.
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Tuesday, 6 June 2017

Update

After DCC’s Reg22 Request and the Environment Agency’s objection, Aggregate Industries has spent the last month running around trying to address the multitude of issues that have been raised in the company's quest to destroy the ancient fields of an East Devon farm.

Readers can make up their own minds why Straitgate Farm, a relatively small site, should still be causing this multinational so much trouble after all these years. Perhaps, as we’ve said all along, the site should simply not be quarried.

Whatever the reason, AI has assured DCC that a response to its Reg22 Request and other matters will be produced by the end of this month, which will then be subject to yet another round of consultation. AI is working towards determination at the DMC meeting of 6 September. However, bear in mind that previous assurances AI has made on dates for Straitgate have rarely been met.

On the issue of water, and following a meeting last month between AI and the EA, the company will this week* embark on yet another round of borehole drilling and piezometer installation to monitor groundwater levels at additional locations. You might have thought that for this relatively small site, deciding where to put a few boreholes would have been a simple matter for AI’s experts - but apparently not. Six boreholes were drilled in 2012. Less than a year later, it was decided that a further five were needed. Amec, AI’s consultants, then helpfully highlighted that there was "no piezometer in the centre of the site" and another two were then installed last year. And this week, contractors will drill and install another five piezometers, this time "around the N/NW perimeter of the site." Three existing piezometers will also be replaced. If AI had simply assured the EA that it would leave the typical 1m unquarried buffer above the maximum water table, it surely wouldn’t be in this mess.


On the issue of ecology and mitigation planting, DCC’s planning and ecology officers met with AI at Straitgate last week. It’s likely that AI has been persuaded to modify the extraction area to reduce the amount of hedgerow lost; something we suggested in our response. Extra standoffs from trees and hedgerows for soil storage are also likely to be agreed. New dormouse and bat surveys are now underway in preparation for AI attempting to secure licences from Natural England.

On the issue of access, AI has apparently resurveyed Birdcage Lane and has produced new draft plans magically showing that two-way HGV traffic can enter and exit the Exeter Road junction within the existing confines of this tiny lane - without the need for third party land. It’s anybody’s guess quite how that’s been achieved.

On the issue of bovine movements across the B3174, AI was at Straitgate this week trying to work out how 150 displaced cows could cross the busy Exeter Road - without bridge, underpass or flashing warning lights - four times a day to new pasture - closing the road for around 20 minutes at a time.

This point alone makes the scheme unworkable. The Exeter Road is the main road into and out of Ottery St Mary. Apart from the obvious safety implications of vehicles, and aggregate HGVs, backing up towards the brow of a hill, AI will also need to explain to the ever growing population of Ottery St Mary why they should face such delays on their drive to and from work and school each day.

And all this to allow the company to truck sand and gravel 23 miles up the M5 for mobile processing.

If AI’s scheme didn’t look like a joke before, it certainly does now.


EDIT * Drilling now due to commence 12.6.17
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Friday, 21 April 2017

AI has decided to do another dormouse survey

Any hopes Aggregate Industries may have had to start ripping out the 2km of hedgerows at Straitgate Farm this year appear to have been dashed. Next week, some 200 dormouse nest tubes will go up around the site. The tubes will be checked for dormice at various points up until October or November.

All of AI’s wildlife surveys are now out of date - but, for now, the dormouse survey is the only one the company has plans to redo. Why would AI want to check for this European Protected Species again, when apparently it hasn’t yet been asked to by DCC or Natural England? It could be that AI knows it won’t secure a licence from Natural England with an out of date survey. Or it could be for another reason.

AI hasn’t done anywhere near enough timely tree planting for the displaced dormice to have anything worthwhile to move into; trees and hedges have been planted in the wrong place, and Exeter Airport also wants large chunks removed. How can AI get around this? It could simply do more planting, and wait for it to grow. Or it could try something else.

The last time AI was backed into a corner and performed an unscripted wildlife survey, it came up with a population of EPS - in that case GCNs - to prove why it couldn’t process material at Rockbeare. This time it will be hoping for the reverse. It will be hoping that the population of dormice has gone, or is certainly less than was discovered before. It will be hoping that the meagre planting that has already been done will be enough to support any population found.

The last population of dormice was found by consultants SLR in 2013. AI has asked a different contractor to do the job this time.

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Saturday, 25 March 2017

PTES ‘strongly objects’ to Straitgate development


People’s Trust for Endangered Species has strongly objected to Aggregate Industries' application to quarry Straitgate Farm, saying:
An extensive amount of important hedgerow will be destroyed. This is completely irreversible. The hedgerows are present on maps dating from the turn of the 20th century (Appendix 1) and are likely to have existed for centuries before this. Compensation planting (for that is what replanting is – not mitigation as suggested) for losses of irreplaceable habitat should be at a ratio in the region of 30 – 1. Proposed replanting and that already done falls far short of this.

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This is what’s at stake


National Library of Scotland has digitised historic maps for the UK. Here's a screen shot showing Straitgate in 1888 with all its hedgerows, most of which are still around today. 

 But the history goes back much further, detailed in these reports to support Aggregate Industries' planning application to quarry Straitgate Farm: Archaeology and Cultural Heritage Report and Results of Archaeological Trench Evaluation: 


Here's a few more snippets from the trench evaluation:
Including the Long Range site and Areas 2 and 6 at Straitgate it is apparent that this Iron Age open settlement extends over an area of potentially c. 10 hectares... based on the geophysics and trench results, around 12-15 further roundhouses in total might be anticipated... Three pieces of Romano-British period tile from overlying deposits and two holed slates from the large ditch in Trenches 22 and 56 may indicate a ‘Romanised’ building is present in the vicinity... new evidence for Romano-British settlement was identified, dated from the artefacts recovered to the 2nd to 3rd centuries AD, including a substantial linear ditch of 30m length, c. 5m width and over 2.2m depth.
Here's a plan showing the scale of open area excavation that would need to be carried out, should AI's scheme proceed.

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What’s AI got to hide?

Since Aggregate Industries' last planning application for Straitgate Farm in 2015, a number of the documents have had a hair-cut. Here are pages 13-17 of AI's Phase 1 Habitat Survey from 2015, and the equivalent accompanying the company's new application.





Why has AI taken the knife to this document? Is it trying to save on paper? Or has AI got something to hide? Is it anything to do with "4.1.4 Potential Impact on Bats" and "4.1.5 Potential Impact on Dormouse"? Anything to do with "4.2 Outline mitigation options"? Anything to do with:
Mitigation and enhancement options will be required as part of the EPS licence application. These are likely to include:
Phased clearance of habitat over a number of years;
Retention of as much species-rich hedgerow as possible, in order to maintain ecological connectivity across the site; and
Strategic (early) planting of additional species-rich hedgerows/woodland such that the habitat is suitable for dormouse when phased vegetation removal commences.
If AI thinks its proposed mitigation plans for European Protected Species are acceptable - why did it see the need to remove this?
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How much compensatory planting has AI done? Google Earth tells us

Aggregate Industries would need to grub up hedgerows at Straitgate that are hundred of years old. Its consultants accept:
the presence of dormouse within the site, a species listed on Schedule 5 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 (as amended), means that all hedgerows within the site may be classified as ‘Important.’ 7.126 
It also claims:
Clearance and extraction of the fields over a 3-phase programme would eventually remove c. 1.75 km of hedgerow 7.195
It's a huge figure, but it's wrong. Because when you measure those hedgerows on Google Earth you find that 2050m would be removed - 1018m, 509m, 234m, 194m, 99m. AI's plans also show another 40m of hedgerow breaks. At a width of 3-4m that's about 0.7ha in total.

Meanwhile, at the Jurston Farm development in Somerset some 2398m of hedgerow, or 0.5ha, is due to be lost. Dormice have been found there too. Somerset County Council's Ecologist proposed an area of compensatory planting, such that six-and-a-half hectares of woodland have already been planted to provide new habitat for dormice; some 30,000 trees. In other words, 13 times the amount to be lost, which is understandable when immature planting is replacing established hedgerows.

How much has AI planted in mitigation? Last time, it eventually came clean in a Reg22 response that "tree planting in the south is a 20m wide strip totalling 1.2ha and comprising 3000 trees" 6.6. But those trees - or 85% of them, "30% oak, 25% silver birch, 15% hawthorn, 15% field maple" - were planted in the wrong place and were meant to be moved:
...the area is higher than 135m AOD and, following the recommendations of the Civil Aviation Authority and Exeter Airport Safeguarding Team, no new trees should be planted in this area. Therefore the tree species that were planted in this area are to be transplanted... 6.12
AI now wants to keep those trees in place, maintaining them "to a maximum of 4m to avoid future use of the habitat as a rookery", but the new application has revised the planting figure down to 1ha.
1 ha of new woodland habitat was advance-planted using native stock in January 2014, and c. 170 m of new hedgerow planted. A further 220 m of new hedgerow will be planted during Phase 1 of the proposed development... The new woodland and hedgerows will be primarily managed for dormice. 7.275
But that figure is wrong as well. Updated Google Earth pictures means we can work out exactly how much was planted, and the answer is 0.76ha, a shortfall of 2,400m2 on what AI claims.



AI would have to apply to Natural England for a licence in order to destroy this bat and dormouse habitat at Straitgate Farm, and demonstrate that it could meet three statutory tests. DCC would need to address these tests when deciding whether to grant planning permission. "If it is clear or perhaps very likely that the requirements of the Directive cannot be met... then the authority should act upon that, and refuse permission".

And how on earth could DCC be confident that Natural England would award a licence for work - when 0.76ha of currently worthless habitat has been planted in mitigation for the destruction of over 2000m of ancient hedgerows?

DCC spelt out the situation in its last Regulation 22 response:
Measures to mitigate adverse landscape and visual impacts are currently too general and unrelated to where adverse effects would be perceived. The purpose and likely effectiveness of advance planting is unclear. Mitigation measures for landscape are not integrated and consistent with ecological and other environmental mitigation.
Nothing appears to have changed since then - apart from Google Earth telling us the truth at last.

On the same basis as Jurston Farm, AI would need to have planted 9ha in mitigation.

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Monday, 13 February 2017

Devon Wildlife Trust tweets about Dormice





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Friday, 3 February 2017

‘Building hedgerows, habitat corridors & bridges is critical to this species' survival’


Dormice inhabit the ancient hedgerows of Straitgate Farm - the same hedgerows that Aggregate Industries plans to destroy. Virtually no established and appropriate mitigation planting is yet in place: 85% of the trees planted will have to be removed for airport safeguarding purposes [6.6, 6.12] and the hedgerows that have been planted are now in the wrong place.

Dormice, a European Protected Species, are on the verge of extinction. New research tells us why:
The existence of the UK's endangered Hazel dormouse is under threat as gaps in tree canopies are leaving the creatures unable to use their hypersensitive whiskers to naturally cross between habitats, a new study reveals...
Gaps in the tree canopy proved to be a major problem for the dormice meaning that gaps in their habitats need to be connected in order to help preserve numbers. Building hedgerows, habitat corridors and dormouse bridges is critical to this species’ survival...
Dr Grant said: “Although dormice can jump quite large distances, when the gaps between platforms were larger than 10-15cm, the dormice started behaving differently – they would eat less of the food available to them and also spend more time travelling on the floor as opposed to the canopy. This behaviour change would put the dormice in danger as this species is vulnerable to threats on the ground.”
Here's where dormice have been found at Straitgate. AI's plans rip right through their habitat.


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