Saturday the 15th was the first opportunity to check the dormouse nest boxes at Stara this month. Having found a pregnant female in July, we were hoping to find a family but with the continuing hot and dry weather, we realised that might not happen and it didn’t, but…

One of our trainees had set up a small number of nest tubes over two months ago. These are inexpensive and most often used by ecologists to find presence or absence on a development site so trainees need to understand how best to employ them. The tubes are much smaller but replicate a narrow crevice or hole in a tree trunk or branch.

And Matt was lucky; first a nest, see photo. Beautifully constructed out of fine grasses and birch leaves. He carried onto to check the next set of tubes where there was not only another nest but a dormouse peeping out at him!

The dormouse sensibly popped out and up the tree where it sat looking down waiting to return. Result: a very happy trainee and we were pleased to be able to add in another record for the woods.

Rain is promised this coming week so the ground cover will green up but I think the birch trees will continue to drop their leaves to help their survival. An early sign of autumn but for a different reason.