4  March 2008

The results of a 2007 survey of water vole on the river Alde show numbers have increased dramatically since the last survey in 2003.

Increases in water vole numbers were recorded in the catchment area, tributaries and main channel of the River Alde. Suffolk Wildlife Trust is cautiously optimistic but feels the results confirm that water vole is indeed making a good recovery in the county.

The news comes at a time when the mammal has won full legal protection following a six year campaign by organisations including Suffolk Wildlife Trust. Appropriately 2008 also marks the centenary of Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows which featured the endearing water vole under the guise of Ratty.

Suffolk has been highlighted as one of the UK’s success stories in terms of water vole recovery but some other counties haven’t faired as well.  In Cornwall the mammals have unfortunately gone on to become extinct,” says Penny Hemphill who heads the Trust’s Water for Wildlife Project which together with the efforts of local landowners, has been instrumental in the increase in water vole numbers.

Having established the water vole’s precarious status in Suffolk, in 2002 the Trust set about tackling the two main factors responsible for this unprecedented decline and began  working with local landowners to improve water vole habitat and setting up a mink control programme to reduce predation.

“Having set up mink control in Suffolk, we realised that mink do not respect county borders - as fast as we were reducing mink numbers in Suffolk, they were pouring in from Essex, Cambridgeshire and Norfolk.  Clearly a regional approach was needed so SWT set up a regional group and we are now working with the Broads Mink Management Project in Norfolk along the River Waveney, with Essex Wildlife Trust along the River Stour, and we are hoping to start working with Cambridgeshire this year to strengthen mink control on the Little Ouse and River Lark,” says Penny.

“The results of the 2007 survey indicate that by controlling mink, water vole have been able to re-colonise parts of the catchment however we cannot become complacent. We need to continue to work with landowners on sustained and thorough mink control if water voles are to successfully re-colonise the whole catchment.” 

There is still a long way to go but with further funding available from the Environment Agency, Essex & Suffolk Water, Anglian Water and Suffolk Environmental Trust, the Trust hopes to improve mink control throughout the county and reverse the water vole’s fortunes for the long term.

For more information please contact Penny Hemphill on 07747 016923 or 01473 737466

ENDS

Notes to editors:

In a 1990 national survey, the eastern region held the highest population of water vole in the country with 72% site occupancy.  The repeat survey eight years later showed a dramatic fall to 29%.  This devastating news and the prediction in the Local Biodiversity Action Plan that this creature would be extinct in Suffolk by 2012, spurred Suffolk Wildlife Trust into action.

From 2003-2005 and with funding from the Environment Agency the Trust set about surveying all the river catchments in Suffolk and the story was even more depressing – further dramatic water vole decline on all rivers, so much so that the River Alde in 2003 had no water vole on its main channel.  However, a 2005 survey of the coastal grazing marshes gave hope – results indicated a healthy water vole population with some key coastal sites where the animals were thriving.

Between 2002-2007 the Trust organised a series of public meetings in each Suffolk river catchment to bring together landowners, land managers, gamekeepers and anyone with a common aim of mink control.  The Trust has worked alongside landowners in improving habitat quality along the main channel of the River Alde.

The results of the 2007 water vole survey of the Alde indicate that:

Water vole site occupancy in the River Alde catchment has significantly increased since the 2003 survey from 10% to 40% in 2007 with water vole recorded at 16 out of 40 sites

Water vole site occupancy on the main channel has increased from 0% in 2003 to 55% in 2007 with water vole populations extending from Dennington downstream to Stratford St Andrew

Water vole site occupancy on the tributaries has increased from 13% to 36% with populations on the upper Ore from Framlingham to Parham, the Thorpness Hundred, the Tang, Black Ditch and Martello Drain

More latrines were recorded in 2007 which indicates more breeding success than in 2003

Habitat quality along the main channel of the River Alde has improved since 2003 with 70% of the sites surveyed ranked as suitable habitat for water vole

The results of the 2007 survey indicate that by controlling mink, water vole have been able to re-colonise parts of the catchment however a more sustained and thorough mink control approach is required if water vole are to successfully re-colonise the whole catchment 

Now that water vole receive full legal protection it will be against the law to intentionally kill a water vole or to intentionally, or recklessly, damage or disturb the places they use for shelter or protection.

When Kenneth Grahame wrote The Wind in the Willows in 1908, water vole were common throughout this country and could be seen and heard on all our waterways.  Little did Grahame know when he created the much loved Ratty, that nearly a century later, this endearing animal would suffer the most rapid and serious decline of any British mammal, and become a protected and priority species in the UK Biodiversity Action Plan. 

The first National Water Vole Survey, funded by the Vincent Wildlife Trust, was undertaken in 1989/90 indicated that water vole had been lost across Britain from some 68% of sites since 1939.  A second repeat survey during 1996 revealed that this loss had accelerated - water voles had been lost from 88% of those sites which had held them only seven years previously. At this point the water vole was on the point of extinction in several counties.