Bowsers, butts, buckets & bottles

By Rick Minter

Martin suggests the gentleman (actually my dad) might be filling his watering can for the garden. Sorry to appear defensive, but all our buckets and containers were already pressed into action catching water alongside the water butts. I'm puzzled at the lack of water butts among my neighbours - why not harness the bountiful precipitation gushing over your roof? Water butts are cheap, effective, low-tech devices and perhaps should come as standard with new homes, as a condition of planning.

Without mains water, it's things like the washing-up that are the challenge: grey water isn't up to it and the bottled stuff seems too precious for the dishes, so hair-washing and the crockery are the main candidates for bowser water in my household. Oh, and like most of the water-deprived Gloucestershire residents, I smell of wet wipes at present. They're a neat way of washing with no, or minimal, water and I feel less guilty having found a supply of biodegradable wipes in Waitrose.

Incidentally, a week ago I'd not heard the word bowser and assumed it was a breed of dog when it was first mentioned. Now it's in common daily use across Gloucestershire and in the media.

There are two lessons I've learnt with the water management this week. Both are simple and obvious, but sink in only at the moment they become real. First, water is heavy stuff. It's tiring to cart water around in buckets and bottles, and I'm glad I don't have that many stairs to negotiate or a baby in the household to magnify the water needs. Of course, carrying water is a daily routine for millions of people elsewhere in the world - aren't we a bunch of softies? The second lesson is how time consuming it all is. I reckon it adds a couple of hours to the daily chores to use water from bowsers, butts, buckets and bottles. Washing up - we do it once at the end of the day to be frugal - takes an age, as do most other mundane functions of rinsing and washing.

Finally, to continue nit-picking Martin's comments, the New Midlands Forest certainly did happen, as the New National Forest (we obviously haven't given it sufficient attention in ECOS), and as for those "puny pumas" we get in Gloucestershire, well, they'll have moved to higher ground as the water rose, meaning even more big cats will be at your door in the Forest, Martin (they prefer deer, rabbits and the odd pet anyway).

Back to the buckets ...

Thoughts on the Floods

By Martin Spray.

Is the gentleman by the bowser about to fill a watering-can? But his garden’s awash! (Of course I’m smug. I’m only a few miles away, but have a 650-feet advantage over the Plaindwellers.)

It may not be PC to say so, but the events of the past few weeks (aka summer) confirm my fear that catastrophe theory is valid. Only by facing extreme conditions do we begin to accept that the views of "weirdoes" and "extremists" might have some validity. Only when peering into the Abyss do we agree that it was silly to rush towards it. Flood-plains are flood-plains are flood-plains. If you live on one, expect floods.

If water can’t go where it wants to go, it will go somewhere else ... or somewhere else. Maybe that should be in the National Curriculum. We shall soon see that ‘natural hazard’ control is like the NHS: there are many great things we can do - but we can’t afford to do them all - and some things we can't (as yet) do. It seems highly unlikely that we can stop it (or start it) raining, or stop the rivers rising. Cnut demonstrated something similar. It’s said that, in 2205 BC, the great waterway engineer Yu reported: “O Sovereign, the Earth has been reduced to order ... and the treasuries of Nature ... are all truly regulated, and may be depended on for ten thousand generations". He was wrong.

What we humans can do - and are quite good at - is live ‘with’ this thing we call Nature. But it involves backing off a bit. We can live on flood-plains, but it might need houses to be built on stilts, or with easily-evacuated basements, or, indeed, to be floatable (but not necessarily houseboats). It would certainly require the acceptance of greater diversity rather than driving for uniformity – in housing, farming, transport, lifestyle. Easy to say, of course, but if you don’t think much of the status quo then it seems reasonable to say it.

Continuing the (apparent) silliness: I remember being taken by the idea of a ‘New Midlands Forest’. I still think it would be a good idea. We should have gone ahead with it. But I wondered why we weren’t also hearing, for instance, about the New Midlands Bog. Or the New Severn Swamp ... perhaps more enticingly named the Severn Everglades (the Severnglades, even)? It would relieve us of the need to deny geography. It would allow whole communities and economies to develop with a wetland ecology. At the shallower end of 'Ecology', it would offer tremendous recreation opportunities. At the Deep End ... well, what a chance for re-wilding! And with global warming, forget puny pumas. Think alligators!

Martin
The Pludds (it means something like 'muddy patch'), Forest of Dean

Business As Usual for ECOS Printer, Severnprint

Loss of power and water in Gloucester on Monday 23rd July, caused by the exceptional flooding in the city, forced ECOS's printer, Severnprint, to close for the day, but a combination of technical innovation, improvised plumbing and the Dunkirk spirit enabled the company quickly to open its doors for business again on the following day, despite the ongoing crisis.

For BANC members and ECOS subscribers, this means that the publication of the upcoming ECOS issue, Vol. 28, No. 2, will proceed on schedule during August.

David Pealing of Severnprint explained to Rick Minter, ECOS editor:

"We recently switched to 'processless plates'. This eliminated our previously largest use of water and so we are working normally, illustrating the benefit of using as few resources as possible. However, without electricity we couldn't work on Monday.

"Our lavatories are working with water that we ship in from outside in our cars and vans. We have rigged up a 12-volt caravan pump which pressurises the cold water system, so we can use the lavatories and cold water sparingly, which is legal!

"So if you have the next ECOS ready, please bring it on!".

For more info and pictures, see http://www.severnprint.co.uk/news_stories/wereback.htm.

July 2007 Floods in Gloucestershire

Photos and comments by Rick Minter

Residents using a water bowser just yards away from the ECOS office in Gloucestershire in July 2007. The River Severn floodwater contaminated a water treatment plant, affecting water supplies in and around Tewkesbury, Cheltenham and Gloucester, with residents and businesses relying on the distribution of bottled water and bowsers. Many water bowsers in Gloucestershire have been subject to irresponsible use, but residents at this one photographed have remarked how it's like having a village pump meeting place.

One of the benefits of the floods and water crisis has been the emergence of a strong community spirit, and one of the challenges will be to cope with the mass use of plastic bottles, with over one million due to be disposed of in coming days and weeks. People are already debating how they can be re-used and recycled, and pressing the authorities for direction on this.
The night the rains came to Gloucestershire. The Hatherley Brook spills its banks and floods the neighbouring golf course.

This photo was taken at 6:30pm. It is unenhanced, to give an impression of the darkness of an early evening in July!







The River Avon in spectacular flood at the Gloucestershire-Worcestershire border.














The following photos were taken just a mile from the ECOS office, a few days after the main event when the water level had subsided!

Wildland Access and Preservation

By Barry Larking

Ed: The following polemic is simply too enjoyable to remain only as a comment on the blog entry by Stanley Owen. It is only slightly edited. Barry, please contact me if you are unhappy with this.

I have just returned from walking in the 'wildland' of Sutherland and Caithness. On one long trek in the sunshine the rest of the UK was not getting I noticed an old friend: the innocent, fragrant Myrica gale, or Bog Asphodel. It brought back memories ...

One afternoon sitting at my desk at the Scottish HQ of the old NCC, minding my own business, I was interrupted by a colleague anxiously seeking help. The problem was urgent, or as urgent as anything at the NCC could be. Tax Dodge Foresters were circling around a prize piece of Highland property, threatening decapitation by furrow and Sitka. How to 'sell' this piece of rain-swept, apparently lifeless, hunk of rock and vegetable waste-ground to the 'Big Public'? 'Bog' did not sound like a good place to begin.

Belatedly the NCC had discovered that science alone cannot turn on the Big Public's juices. Descriptions of oligotrophic processes, infertile build-ups of plant matter and specialised micro-climate strategies (the total absence of anything resembling a life-form, as it is generally understood, was not mentioned, obviously): none of this could swing a reprieve. Even now an official would be standing over a politician, pen in hand, telling him to sign away the future of (putative) eagles and falcons for the good of the country's timber supply (allegedly). What to do? Think up a name that would elicit the Big Public's sympathy.

For some reason Myrica gale got the gig. Could I think of another way to describe this plant in such a way as to grab the Big Public's imagination? Drop 'Bog' for starters, obviously. Too many unpleasant connotations ... or not enough, anyway. Could I re-invent this harmless little plant in the spotlight? I think I was too abashed at being asked such a question. I could not.

My colleague left the room, deep in travail. Eventually, the NCC's hand was forced and Creag Meghaidh was purchased for the people. Problem solved. My little friend grows on in humble innocence of its near moment of greatness. But what has this to do with 'wildland' and access?

Forty years ago British conservation met its Waterloo at Cow Green, Upper Teesdale (1). The failure to secure this site for its great significance to natural history created a deep and lasting shock wave within conservation circles. It was concluded that lessons had to be learned. Now history is full of examples of wrong lessons being learnt from such traumatic events and losses ... and the fall-out from Cow Green, I suggest, was among them.

The conclusion drawn at the time was that the presentation of the case against the reservoir by the objectors – scientists to the fore – was flawed. Lawyers for the scheme's promoters were able to demonstrate that the expert witnesses were either ill-informed or simply unable convincingly to prove a case. What was required then, by future conservationists, was data: solid, verifiable, statistically valid fact. This eventually gave me a job behind a desk in Edinburgh, so I should not be too harsh. But it was clear to me then - and is now - that the case for defending 'wildlands' does not rest with science. It is a political question.

Nearly all professional conservationists I have encountered are apolitical and distrust the political process. One can hardly blame them. Politicians are by training and experience 'hedgers and trimmers' - they must be to survive and prosper. The 'ecology' of politics is for only the most adaptable of creatures. But politicians have power and must be studied. Their Achilles' Heel is their love of winning – elections, votes, arguments – and wrapping themselves in the warm glow of public adulation. So threaten their votes.

'Wildlands' are the least inviting places to the Telly Generation it is possible to conceive. I hardly exaggerate - most normal people would not regard a windswept, wet, steep, soggy, potentially dangerous stretch of upland country as anything but 'uninviting'. Unless a road goes through it, it remains attractive to a few ... and then intermittently. To some - and I am one - the remoteness is attractive. But we are not many and political strength is weighed, not counted. The route to enlarging understanding of, and protection for, 'wildlands' lies through political action.

Foremost, the Big Public must be made to care about places few would wish to visit, leave alone walk over. This will be best achieved by cultural forces. One outstanding example of this was the recent programme made by Andrew Motion, the Poet Laureate, about Orfordness, where a combination of histories – national, individual, private, ecological and spiritual - were woven together. Orfordness is a woebegone place in many ways, but a beautifully crafted film and a superb script did a masterful job of convincing us just why such places are important. It made a point and it stuck.

Sucking up to landowners is meat and drink to conservation bodies ... it always was and it remains the case. We are none of us permanent features and landownership does not confer anything. It is just a consequence, not a constant. In the few places where the feeling of 'wildland' can be plausibly summoned up, ownership is as much a liability as anything. Few can offer more than shooting wildlife for sport as an opportunity for income. Forestry ought to be a busted flush by now (does anyone work out how much it costs to go and get this fifth-rate junk?) and tourism would need to be for fatalists or masochists.

Where is the tax payer in all this? Can we afford to finance the lifestyle of these people for much longer? The Arts Council exists to encourage the arts, to create opportunities for performance and endeavour, to create a space of the arts in everyone's life. The Sports Council, ditto, for sport; and also the Crafts Council. The Nature Conservancy Council existed to discourage anyone going anywhere near wildlife unless it was in their own backyard. It pinned its colours to the masthead of the landowners and perished. The broken remnants continue, but I expect the policies are similar, the results equally dim.

In fact, conservationists have realised that the easiest way to deal with this 'wildland' access issue is to ignore it. Remote places will protect themselves. That - and a certain snottiness on the part of one's hirelings - will deter the 'Mob of the Unwashed' or, pace Owens, merely envious, from venturing far from the lay-by. So it is with the creatives that the task of cherishing, celebrating and, finally, preserving wildlands, must rest.

(1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_Green_Reservoir 16 June 2007 16:32

Home Counties Wildland ... another view

Stanley Owen responds to Dave Bangs (see blog of Thursday, 29 March 2007) ...

Dave Bangs' outlook on access to land and to wild places appears pretty depressing. Maybe he should change the tint of his spectacles. It just looks like a rant against somebody wealthier than he is.

Even if we agree with his political view of capital and wealth, it cannot be productive for people pushing the case for more wild land and wild nature to take socialist revolution or socialist reform on to our agenda. Though an admirable cause, it would represent a massive distraction from our already challenging aims, and we would be unlikely to achieve very much.

We should be promoting public access as a social benefit of wild land, in support of the principle of public investment in wild land. However, I would resist reversing that logic: it is not true that privately owned wildland needs to be tied to open public access. Says who? And how would it be enforced? We are going to see many forms of wild land, in different types of ownership. We should welcome any case where natural ecological processes are allowed to dominate. Access is a separate issue.

I think a philosophy of encouraging private landowners, without wanting to dictate how they manage their affairs, is correct. Peter Taylor is right in his answer to Bangs that public and NGO land managers are still not getting it with wild land. I believe that this will change and that these will be where we see more public "ownership" and better access. I think there is better potential for larger areas with these. And less of an issue of making a business.

Stanley Owen

ECOS EXCHANGE Water vole survival and the role of mink control Lessons from the River Chess

In ECOS 28 (1), Catherine Shellswell and Allan Beechey reported on work along the River Chess in the Chilterns to provide habitat management advice and mink control for riparian landowners, in order to counteract a decline in the water vole population.

Here, in unabridged form, Trevor Lawson, author of an earlier article on the same subject*, challenges the authors (in black text below), and Shellswell and Beechey reply (in blue text).

1. Trevor Lawson:
The authors comment on their provision of fencing to provide "buffer zones" for water voles and other wildlife, yet the linear extent of these buffer zones is not quantified. They are very limited. Criticisms about the wholly inadequate depth of the buffer zones are not addressed. Further, the authors make no attempt to distinguish between the contribution that the alleged buffer zones made to water vole recovery, compared to the benefits delivered by mink culling. It is, of course, impossible to distinguish between the benefits of habitat and culling using the methodology adopted in this study (and adopted in other Environment Agency-supported projects). The Chilterns Conservation Board was warned of this weakness in the methodology prior to initiating culling and strongly advised to address it, but ignored the advice.

Catharine Shellswell & Allan Beechey reply:
Whilst in an ideal world the desirable buffer zone width would be 6m, in practice a pragmatic approach must be taken to negotiate a buffer zone. In the majority of cases the landowner will be unwilling to lose a 6m deep section of his/her land. In this instance a fence was erected along a 500m stretch of river 1m away from the edge of the watercourse. The adjacent field downstream had already been fenced by the landowner. The first two metres are the most important for water voles and the fence has stopped horses and cattle entering the river enabling lush marginal vegetation to develop. The decreased disturbance has also benefited the water voles. Placement of this fencing has clearly enabled the water vole population to increase and it is hoped that the area of bank fenced from the field could be extended in the future. Currently there is a project being undertaken by WildCRU investigating water vole population growth and individual vole growth compared to amount of bankside habitat. This type of project has not been undertaken before and hopefully it will provide weight to the provision of more bankside habitat for water voles.

2. Trevor Lawson:
One landowner allegedly trapped nine mink in 2003-4, prior to the culling scheme. None were made available to WildCRU and no records are available viz the age, sex or health of this sample. Yet a trout fishery less than two miles downstream trapped no mink. Polecats have returned to the Chilterns since 1997. What attempt was made to validate this sample?

Catharine Shellswell & Allan Beechey reply:
The eight mink trapped by the landowner were caught in a trap that he had been running for a number of years. We know that they were a female and young. Unfortunately we do not have any other information on the mink as they were caught prior to the start of the trapping scheme organised by BBOWT and the Chiltern Chalk Streams Project, and therefore did not fall under the remit of providing them to WildCRU. At the time when the first mink was caught (September 2003) the young mink would have just started to disperse away from their mother, but would still stay fairly close to the natal territory (which is approximately 3km in length). This would have restricted the range of the juvenile mink and they may not have ventured downstream to the fishery. There is also the possibility that the mink dispersed across land rather than along the watercourse (males tend to live away from the watercourse for the majority of the year and come back to breed with females in autumn, winter and early spring). The ninth mink was killed on a nearby road in March 2004 and it is believed that this was the last mink to be caught from this group. It was very difficult to determine the gender of this individual once it had been flattened and it was also considered unsuitable for WildCRU to autopsy. The two mink sent to WildCRU were incorporated into their mink and polecat project which has been running since 2003.

3. Trevor Lawson:
A 2003 water vole survey found that the voles had "dramatically" declined since 2001. Yet their disappearance was reported from sites where I continued to observe them.

Catharine Shellswell & Allan Beechey reply:
Unfortunately, it is very hard to prove a negative survey as there is always an element of observer error. For example, surveys carried out from the bankside may miss signs close to the water edge (this is only undertaken where the watercourse is too deep, and once the vegetation has grown field signs may have been missed. This is stated in the survey results. BBOWT collects sighting reports from people who have seen water voles, and if these occur along stretches of watercourse which haven’t been surveyed every effort is made to survey these areas to confirm the presence of water voles. Water voles can also live at low population densities, and this reduces the number of field signs that they leave. Might I suggest that Mr Lawson sends in his water vole sighting to the Water Vole Recovery Project (please see the online record form at www.bbowt.org.uk for details) as we would be interested in any information that he could provide.

4. Trevor Lawson:
The subsequent mink culling scheme initiated in February 2004 along virtually the entire catchment, only removed two mink, even though the project had concluded that mink had dispersed along the river and were breeding.

Catharine Shellswell & Allan Beechey reply:
Mink were breeding along the catchment at the time of survey (August-September 2003) near to Bois Mill where eight mink were caught and one killed on the road (as mentioned earlier). The placement of mink rafts allowed the watercourse to be monitored for mink (using a footprint tracking pad) and once footprints were identified a live capture trap was placed on the raft and the mink removed accordingly (these were the two caught in march 2004). In actual fact without any form of mink control eleven mink would have been able to disperse along the river. The mink rafts are primarily a monitoring device that can be used as a trap once mink have been identified in the vicinity.

5. Trevor Lawson:
Mink signs have only been found since at the site where nine mink were allegedly trapped in 2003-4. The authors make no attempt to assess why this site, which is not at the confluence with any other water course or dry valley, and where the Chess is particularly canalised adjacent to a busy road, should be the focal point for mink arrival and dispersal.

Catharine Shellswell and Allan Beechey reply:
The site where the mink were caught is in farmland and is not canalised. It is also fairly wooded at the location where large and small mink footprints were found. It is also near a stocked lake and the confluence of two channels. It is an ideal den site as it is undisturbed.

6. Trevor Lawson:
Water vole signs increased five-fold by 2005 and this improvement is attributed to mink culling. Yet no other variables – in particular the impact of winter flooding - have been factored into this analysis. Much of the river Chess has no suitable banks for water voles to burrow in and where those banks do exist there is a risk of flooding due to the rapid run-off from intensively managed land. Flooding is a known major cause of water vole mortality.

Catharine Shellswell & Allan Beechey reply:
Generally the land alongside the River Chess is not intensively managed. Very little is cultivated and most of the pasture is remnant water meadows. The water meadows are grazed, but on the whole stocking levels remain low as the land does not support a high proportion of animals. Where stocking densities are slightly higher fences have been erected to protect the banks. Therefore, flooding due to runoff from intensively managed farmland along the River Chess is not an issue. Between 2001 and 2003 there were no large flood events that affected the entire valley which would have caused the demise of the water vole population by 98%. There were also no local flood events which would have had a greater impact than normal. Water vole populations can reduce by up to 70% during the winter period and flooding is a cause of death. The lack of flood events in this time period and the extent of the decline points to other factors affecting water voles such as the dispersal of American mink along the river rather than a large flood event.

7. Trevor Lawson:
The authors should have considered other possibilities before drawing their conclusions. For example, that before the 2001 baseline survey, water voles had expanded their range to less optimal parts of the river. Subsequent flooding or another factor (mink are a possibility, of course) then reduced the population to those optimum parts of the river identified in the 2003 study. It is surely no coincidence that these sites also have the very best vegetative habitat and structural diversity.

Catharine Shellswell & Allan Beechey reply:
Water voles follow a metapopulation structure and do experience population rises, where they disperse along the river corridor, and falls, where their range contracts. The water vole population along the River Chess decreased by 98% according to the surveys. The surveys were both carried out at the same time of year; this avoids seasonal population density variation when comparing the two surveys and also points to the decline being extreme between 2001 and 2003. All three surveys were carried out using the standard methodology for surveying water voles (described in the water vole conservation handbook). It would be beneficial if we had information about the water vole population prior to this date to assess whether the water vole population in 2001 was unusually high, unfortunately this is not the case. As stated earlier, flooding had already been discounted as a cause of the decline.

The mink trapped in March 2004 were caught between the two remaining colonies of water voles, and if the female had stayed in this area (which is a high possibility as mink were seen entering a good den site under a nearby barn, and the river at this location is fairly undisturbed), both colonies were within an average territory size of a female. Furthermore, not all the water vole field signs were located along the optimal habitat. Some were located in back gardens which had close mowing regimes. BBOWT and the Chiltern Chalk Streams Project have been providing advice to landowners to help them encourage water voles through sympathetic management of the bankside. This includes leaving areas of uncut vegetation along the river which provides cover from predators.

8. Trevor Lawson:
The authors state: "Mink control should always be implemented where habitat advice is also provided to landowners." Many landowners receive habitat advice but it is clearly impractical for mink control to be implemented in every instance. Perhaps the authors actually mean: "Mink control should only be implemented if habitat advice is also provided to landowners." This, too, is unwise. Habitat advice is quite different from actual habitat creation or restoration. Advice alone will not contribute to water vole recovery.

Catharine Shellswell & Allan Beechey reply:
We stand corrected in that mink control should always be implemented (where practical) where water voles are found to be present and habitat advice should always be provided to landowners. Mink control is not always practical for example in areas with high human activity as they tend to disturb mink traps and rafts. However, the rafts are placed at 1km intervals (optimum density according to the Game Conservancy Trust) and usually these areas can be avoided. Mink were found to be present during the 2003 water vole survey and are considered the larger threat to water voles in Berks, Bucks and Oxon. The water vole colonies have shrunk to such a degree that there is a great amount of habitat available for inhabitation by water voles, but their population is controlled by mink. This means that in most cases a monitoring scheme to investigate the presence of mink is implemented at the same time that habitat advice is provided and mink are removed (resources and landowners allowing) once their presence has been found. Where areas of unsuitable habitat provide a barrier to dispersal (such as heavily scrubbed sections of watercourse over 1-2km in length or artificial banks) habitat advice is provided and where funding allows habitat enhancement or restoration is undertaken. Farmers are encouraged into agri-environment schemes, homeowners are encouraged to leave uncut strips and mitigation is provided as part of planning applications. Habitat management is carried out to create a mosaic of habitats along a watercourse which would benefit a range of species rather then just one, and it is not suitable to make every stretch of watercourse ideally suited to water voles, otherwise you would be destroying the optimum habitat for otters. There is no legislation to enforce provision of habitat for water voles, only to protect water vole burrows, and therefore we provide advice to landowners where they can be persuaded to carry forward action. This may be provided through agri-environment schemes or other local grant bodies interested in water vole conservation. As there is a large amount of habitat available along the River Chess, it was felt that habitat was not the influencing factor in the water vole decline and since mink were found during the water vole survey it was determined that resources were best placed in a monitoring and trapping programme along the watercourse.

9. Trevor Lawson:
Loss and fragmentation of habitat is the primary cause of water vole decline and impacts on a wider range of species, too. Had this project been planned strategically, with rigorous scientific methodology, with the needs of other wildlife in mind and for the long term, the authors would state: "Mink control should only be considered when habitat restoration has been successfully implemented but has failed to reverse the decline in water voles."

Catharine Shellswell & Allan Beechey reply:
The statement ‘loss and fragmentation of habitat is the primary cause of water vole decline’ can not be verified scientifically. It is currently considered that habitat loss and the dispersal of American Mink throughout the countryside are jointly considered to have caused the decline (see the Water Vole UK BAP). Habitat loss has caused the decline over the greater part of the 20th Century, but the decline was particularly severe after the Second World War when the government encouraged increased agricultural production and during the 1970s-80s due to increased urbanisation and installation of flood defences. During the 1980s it was realized that American mink were spreading throughout Britain (as well as Europe where they threaten the European mink) and the water vole population appeared to be declining in their wake. There are numerous examples of mink predating water voles to extinction through radio-telemetry studies and mink scat analysis. It is unlikely that we would still be losing water voles without mink as habitat is not sufficiently poor in many areas to explain their more recent demise. The biggest single barrier to their recovery would seem to be a non-native predator which has an almost unique ability to exploit this species. Concentrating on habitat to the exclusion of mink will unfortunately not stop the decline of the water vole. Implementation of mink control is not taken lightly and all factors are considered prior to any mink rafts and traps being deployed. Certainly in regard to the River Chess the mink control has stopped the demise of the water vole. If the two mink were not caught in March between the remaining water vole colonies, it would probably be another sad story where water voles have become extinct. The mink rafts now provide a valuable monitoring tool for both ad hoc water vole presence and also to provide an early warning system of any mink that may disperse back to the river. The increase in the water vole population between 2003 and 2005 shows that mink control and habitat enhancement has been successful at the moment and we hope that the water vole population will continue to increase. The survey will be repeated next year (with the landowners permission) to assess the range of the water vole population.


* Lawson. T (2005) 'Seen a mink? Unleash the dogma!', ECOS 26 (3/4) pp81-85.