Wildlife Conservation Day 2025

Happy Wildlife Conservation Day! We caught up with Mark, our Conservation and Environment Officer, to hear about the exciting wildlife conservation projects he’s working on now and what he has planned for the future.

An important part of our Woodland Management Plan we are working on now will be its provision for one of our many species of furry friend we have at Rare Breeds Centre – the Hazel Dormouse. The name is a little misleading, as the important European Protected Species doesn’t rely specifically on hazel trees too much, but it comes from the fact the structure of hazel woodland that is coppiced on a relatively short rotation often makes for their ideal habitat.

When hazel is coppiced, which means to harvest it and encourage healthy new growth, more light is allowed to reach the woodland floor, and a diverse mosaic of trees, flowering plants, grasses and brambles springs to life. Throw a few native small trees into the mix, like the blackthorn, dogwood, field maple, guelder rose and spindle that thrive in many a Kent hedgerow, and you have a scrubby hotchpotch with plenty of the nuts, seeds, berries, flowers and insects that dormice love to eat. The important things here are plenty of cover and plenty of food.

It should then come as no surprise that dormice also love hedgerows, as the structure of these is very similar to coppiced woodland in many ways. A nice wide pathway or woodland glade also make for great dormouse habitat. The key to improving our dormouse population is to ensure we have plenty of all these habitats, and most importantly they all need to be joined up; connectivity is key. The reduction in traditional long-term woodland and hedgerow management is one of the main reasons why dormouse numbers in the UK have fallen by more than half over the last 15 years. We need to put this right!

On a walk-around with our resident dormouse expert towards the end of last summer I was encouraged to hear there is great potential for us to improve our dormouse numbers here at Rare Breeds Centre. Many aspects of our Woodland Management Plan that we hope we will have in place around this time next year, such as woodland thinning and traditional practices such as hedge laying, will in themselves be beneficial for dormice. If we go out of our way to ensure these things are all linked together in a dormouse-friendly way, with additional habitat creation thrown into the mix as well, then things look very promising. On that note, I’ll be planting a few native hedgerow trees this week, all the time daydreaming about how they may one day make a suitable home for some of our precious dormouse residents.