November 23, 2022 • 34 mins
S4E36 You join us in a secret location this week. Back in 2019, Scotty Dodd from the Sussex Bat Group made the most significant discovery in the history of the bat group...the first maternity roost of greater horseshoe bats in Sussex for one hundred years. Truly the find of the century! In a small dry valley surrounded by beech trees, Scotty & Steve are sat in front of the run-down stable block as Scotty describes to Steve how he came across the roost and got the verification he was looking for.
As you'll hear in this episode, the team need a lot of money to save this roost and improve it so that the colony has every chance of survival. So if you can,
donate to the JustGiving appeal here
See the roost on the VWT website
See what else the Sussex Bat Group get up to and follow them on twitter
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Steve Roe (00:08):
Hello and welcome to BatChat from the Bat
Conservation Trust. This podcastis for anyone who loves bats. We
bring you the stories from theworld of bat conservation, from
the people on the ground doingwork that furthers our
understanding of these magicalcreatures. There's a lot of
information and experience outthere and our aim is to bring it
right to you. I'm Steve Roe; I'man ecologist and a trustee of
(00:30):
the Bat Conservation Trust.
Don't forget you can join theconversation online using the
hashtag BatChat that's all oneword. Later on, we'll hear from
BatChat listener Wendy who tellsus about the bats she's living
alongside. But first this week,we come to you from a secret
location near Midhurst in WestSussex, recorded in July with
Scotty Dodd from the Sussex batgroup. We're sat in a small
(00:50):
block of woodland at the bottomof a dell on a leaf covered
track leading to a rundownbuilding hidden amongst the
trees. In 2019, Scotty madeprobably one of the bat groups
most important discoveries, thefirst greater horseshoe bat
maternity roost in Sussex for100 years. As the evening breeze
moves through the beech treesaround us, he starts off by
taking us through the story ofhow he discovered the roost that
(01:12):
we're both sat in front ofduring this interview.
Scotty Dodd (01:17):
Okay, yeah, so as you say, I found it in 2019, it
was still winter, so February,February, the 14th. And at the
time, it was just a single bat.
And obviously, I told people inthe bat group, Tony Hudson, and
Martin Phyllis. And the generalconsensus of opinion was that
we've occasionally seen thesebats turn up in structures
(01:40):
before, and they've usuallydisappeared by May, and we've no
idea where they go. But we thinkthey might gather somewhere for
a small maternity roost. So atthat point, I started putting
passive bat detectors, trailcameras, that sort of thing in
the building, so we couldmonitor whether activity went up
(02:00):
or down. That year, the batsweren't particularly visible,
it's quite a large building. Andthe there's areas of the roof
void that you just can't viewinto without being very
disturbing, using ladders, thatsort of thing. Which if it was a
maternity roost we wouldn't wantto be doing throughout the
summer, and you know, causingthe bats to abandon the
(02:22):
building. And so we were doingeverything very carefully. And
all that we got in the firstyear was some tantalising
ultrasound calls, which we sentto Margaret Andrews, who's done
an awful lot of work on greaterand lesser horseshoe bats over
the years. And it took us sometime and deliberation. But
(02:43):
eventually she got back to us.
And said, I've measured and remeasured your calls for a number
of times set about it, thoughtabout it gone back to it. And
now I'm absolutely sure thatwhat you've recorded is a mother
carrying the baby, and someother evidence of juvenile
calls. And then she said,categorically, when we talked
(03:06):
about numbers of bats beingcaught on the trail cam, rather
than going down to zero, we werestarting to see two, three,
maybe four on the trail cam, butthe image isn't great. And she
said, Well, bats will only begathering at a building that
this time of year and makingthese sorts of social calls, if
it's a maternity roost. And ofcourse, we were seeing on the
(03:27):
emergence surveys, you know,more and more bats starting to
emerge from the building until Ithink we had a maximum in the
first year of five or six. In2020, we had a much luckier time
we still had all your recordingequipment in there. But the bats
were good enough to spend a lotof time roosting at the end of
(03:48):
the building, where we couldview them from from a real
window. So we were literallystood outside of the bat roost,
just filming in through a grill.
And it was then that we made thediscovery of the first baby and
which then within a few weeksbecame a cluster of babies or
pups. And yeah, we've we've goneon from there really.
Steve Roe (04:13):
So what's the largest counts then of these horseshoes
you've had so far?
Scotty Dodd (04:17):
Well, in 2020, we had six adult females that had
three pups and we think we lostone of the pups to a tawny owl
we had some trail cam footage ofof the owl up in the roof void
being swarmed by the bats andwhat looked like a limp bat wing
(04:37):
between the the rafters and sureenough, the the subsequent count
I think we only had eight comingout instead of nine. So we we
think we lost one nature red intooth and claw. This year, I
think 2021 We didn't have asmuch luck but this year we've
had a maximum of nine adults andAnd so far, and we need to check
(05:01):
again this evening. So far we'vehad five pups. But also, even in
the winter hibernation surveys,we've been having record
numbers, Nick Grey and his teamrecorded across the several
tunnels that they survey, atotal of 13 bats, and that was
in conjunction with DanielWhitby, who was going to some of
(05:24):
the structures where he knew thebats overwintered as well. So
all the Sussex bat ecologistshave been coordinating so we can
get the best information on theestimated population size.
Steve Roe (05:36):
And like you say you've been working with other
ecologists who suspected thatthere was a population here, how
many of the different sitesroughly, have you been recording
these bats in the winter then?
Scotty Dodd (05:47):
The several tunnels I do I do do some of the tunnel
checks myself, but I've not beento all of them. And Tony is
probably best best placed toanswer that. Because, you know,
he's been doing it since sincethe bat group began. But yeah,
they're, they use several of thetunnels, some more than others.
And then there's, as I say, acouple of other structures that
(06:08):
other ecologists are aware of,as well.
Steve Roe (06:12):
So, I mean, we've seen this, this has attracted a
lot of media attention and theheadlines that's been grabbed by
everyone is, this is the firstmaternity roost of greater
horseshoe bats in Sussex for atleast 100 years. You've
attracted lots of mediaattention with this good news
story. And you've even got thebroadcaster and author Stephen
Moss involved. Why is this roostso significant for for the South
(06:35):
East of England?
Scotty Dodd (06:36):
Well it's a pioneering roost. Greater
horseshoe bats suffered amassive decline. We've all heard
some horror stories about, youknow, the catastrophic number of
casualties at say, Creech manorin Dorset. You know, going back
probably 50 years. And thenumbers drop somewhere in the
(06:57):
90%, I think was it. And theywere completely lost from well,
as a breeding species. As far aswe knew from the southeast of
England. The the only records wewere really getting was
occasional individuals or asmall number of individuals in
winter hibernation sites. Butthe feeling was that it was
(07:19):
possible they could be breeding.
So So to find that, you know,it's absolute luck. You know,
it's a needle in a haystackthing. But yeah, as luck would
have it, the the building theywere using, came came under my
nose.
Steve Roe (07:34):
And when she had found that discovery, and Maggie
Andrews had confirmed it wasindeed a maternity roost, how
quickly did you move to protectthe site and the bats and make
the landowner aware of thesignificance?
Scotty Dodd (07:46):
Once again, we were very, very lucky. The landowner
was an executor. And he was justsorting out the sort of will of
the guy who owned this, and toall intents and purposes had
been an absentee landlord, hadbought the place and not really
done anything with it in his30/40 years of tenure, or
(08:06):
whatever it was. And so theydidn't really have a great
vested interest. There was moreland within the parcel that we
don't own. And there's anothersort of two and a half acres,
and then there were variousmeadows and other bits and bobs.
And the executor had come upwith a plan a housing scheme, if
you like, within the area, andthat that just didn't even get
(08:31):
off the ground. So they werelooking at converting this
building were at into aresidence. And, you know, we
sought advice from NaturalEngland, would they even can see
to letting that go ahead. As ithappened. Yes, they would,
because I think they had theforesight to see that if no one
did anything, the building wasgoing to fall down. I mean, as
(08:54):
soon as we discovered the placethieves came and stole a lead
off the roof. And from thatpoint in, it started to
deteriorate. You know, it'squite an old building. It was
built in, in around the 1830s1840s. And so the the internal
construction is lath and plasterrather than, you know, modern
plaster boards, that was gettingsaturated and falling down in
(09:14):
huge chunks, which was lettingthe light into the bats roosting
area. It was it was changing theairflow, so many things going
against it. So we had to come upwith a plan. But I think that
the executor at the time,realised that was going to be
not only a long but potentiallyvery expensive road if he had to
(09:36):
provide roosting space for thebats within the building or an
alternative. And so I sort ofsaid, well, what if I could find
someone who might be interestedin in buying it as is just for
conservation, and we settled ona price as everyone should know
by now that's been following acampaign that was £200k and we
(09:57):
we are in the heart of the SouthDowns and National Park. So
land, buildings premium. And wewent around a few organisations,
it was a very, very difficulttime, the pandemic had just kind
of come upon us, people didn'tknow what was happening and, and
no one wanted to take the risk.
But Vincent Wildlife Trust, wereinterested and did take that
(10:19):
risk. And now we're working inpartnership as a bat group. And
Vincent Wildlife Trust to toraise the funds needed. Now
we've purchased the building, wenow need to repair it and
there's a lot of repairs,there's there's damage to one of
the walls, the roof needscompletely replacing and anyone
who's done any building workduring the pandemic, will be
(10:41):
acutely aware how costs haverisen for doing this, you know,
everything from batons to slatesis a lot more expensive than it
was two, three years ago.
Steve Roe (10:53):
And you've done you've answered my next
question, you know, what, whatplans are there to improve the
site? Are you going to improveany of the internal features for
the bats to use, as well asmaking the building watertight?
Etc?
Scotty Dodd (11:05):
Yeah, so once we've made it weatherproof, there's
other things we need to do. Butwe need to do it carefully. And
we need to do it incrementally.
So at the moment, it's abeautiful building, it's it's
saying we can't show it to youon an audio,
Steve Roe (11:20):
I was gonna say do you want to do an audio
description to describe whatwe're set in front of them.
Scotty Dodd (11:23):
So it's, it's a classic textbook, greater
horseshoe bat building. It's alarge old Victorian stable block
made out of local stone withbrick coins, and a pitch slate
roof. But it wasn't just any oldstables for any old nags. This
(11:44):
was for a polo team. And thelandscape around this has
changed considerably. You know,we're set, essentially in an in
a woodland, we but you see howthe land slopes up away from us,
we're kind of in a dell here.
And you'll notice if you can seethrough all the nettles and
whatnot over here now, that isactually quite flat along the
top. And that's where they usedto I'm told exercise, the horses
(12:06):
just walking around just just towarm them up. And then yeah, and
then they had out in the widerarea, there were various other
training grounds and polo fieldsand whatnot. It's got excellent
flight and access via the maindoor. And then there's several
windows that aren't blocked bygrills or anything else. And the
(12:29):
bats are quite curious. They'redown the far end of the building
are up in the roof void. Andthere's many places where they
could egress from the building,but they choose to fly up and
down the corridor, which somepeople call light sampling,
Margaret Andrews call it socialflight. And they always come out
the front door. Every time thesebats have manners, they'll try
(12:52):
and confuse either fly back intothe windows, but then they'll
always come back out the dooragain. But because we've got
problems with predators, we'vehad cats, owls, humans, all
coming into the bat roost, weneed to do something to as I
say, gradually start blockingthese exits off so predators and
people can't get in there. Butthe bats can still get in and
(13:14):
out and aren't put off. So wedon't want to do anything too
quickly. Just putting it off andleaving them a little letterbox.
We need to do it slowly,probably over a couple of years.
Steve Roe (13:26):
And you recommend those sorts of improvements, the
roof size may well increase overtime.
Scotty Dodd (13:30):
Well, I think once it's weather tight, once it's
secure, that gives them the bestchance but there's so much more
we can do. And it all reallydepends on how generous the
public are, how generous thegrant funds are, and how much we
can raise because to give themthe best chance and to enhance
or maximise on colony growth. Imean, and as you well know as a
(13:53):
bat lover, you know bats ingeneral have about one younger
year. So it's always going to beslow when you're you're starting
with with only nine bats and ofcourse greater horseshoe bats
can take four or five years toreach sexual maturity. So they,
you know, a female pup born thisyear, won't be producing for for
(14:14):
several more years. So it'sgoing to be a slow game. But if
we can afford to put in heatersand hot boxes, and other heat
variations, say cool cool boxesor cool rooms, cooler areas
within the roost. We can makethe roost better for the bats at
different times of years andmaximise on colour comment and
(14:37):
growth at the time when itmatters in summer.
Steve Roe (14:40):
And that's what horses need is that they want
something that's got a range oftemperatures to be suitable for
both summer and winter.
Scotty Dodd (14:46):
Yes, I mean they have got the hibernation tunnels
as well but there's a potentialhere for us to give them another
safe option. I mean, because thetunnels are great but I mean I'm
I'm aware that they get brokeninto here and there and That
must be quite disturbing for thebats, particularly if it's cold
winter, not that we're havingtoo many of them. But yeah, we
just want to give them as manyoptions as possible.
Steve Roe (15:08):
So if they're here in this building, are they then
also somewhere else nearby, youknow, is there another rooster
or another population even,
Scotty Dodd (15:16):
I would be surprised if there was another
breeding population Never saynever. And it'd be wonderful if
they did have an alternative. Weare aware of other structures,
buildings, undergroundstructures, and of course, the
the old railway tunnels thatthey use at different times of
year. And certainly, some ofthese are what you might call
(15:38):
spring and autumn transitionalroofs. So it can always be a bit
quiet here in around April,early May. But we've got an
inkling by working with otherbat ecologists of where they are
or might be. And and there's agood spread these sites across
Sussex. There's also otherstructures that we now have, the
(16:00):
less important, in fact, there'sone here on another part of the
site. That's just a nightrooster feeding roost. So so
we've got evidence that they goin there, they their beetles,
eat their mouths, and undo theirdroppings, etc.
Steve Roe (16:15):
And what did it feel like when you walked into this
building and saw horseshoes? Youknow, what was that feeling like
to discover the roost?
Scotty Dodd (16:21):
A bit overwhelming to be perfectly honest, you
know, I don't consider myself abat expert at the level of Tony
Hutson and whatnot. And so I hadmy infrared camera with me, I
got a good zoomed in image ofthis bat. And it's almost like
your brains telling you itcannot be a horseshoe bat, you
(16:44):
must be mistaken, it must besomething else. So I got it
home, blew it up on the bigscreen. And I was, you know, a
certain as I could be, but Istill sent it to my mentor
Martin Phyllis, and said,Please, Martin, you've just got
a double check, because he hadlots of experience of Horseshoe
bats. He's another back groupmember who's been doing it for
(17:05):
years and going into thechannels for years. So he was
very familiar. And so that'sgreat. He goes, Yes, Well done,
Scotty. But you know, at thatpoint, again, it was still well,
let's wait and see what happens.
But let's not get too excitedjust yet.
Steve Roe (17:20):
And how quickly do you need to raise those funds,
then?
Scotty Dodd (17:25):
Well, the bats start to leave the building
after the maternity season. Andso sort of September October, we
should in theory, be able tostart doing some of the work.
And as I say we're going tophase it, I mean, the most
important thing is going to bestructural stuff. And getting
the roofs got to come offcompletely. All the timbers
(17:47):
replaced. And then it's goingback on with all new slates.
We've got slates here, we couldreuse them. But you know, they
were put up there in the 1840sperhaps. And so you know, how
much life have they got left inthem, a lot of them are broken
and crumbly. So VWT think it'sbest just to put all new and
(18:07):
then then you know, it's got 100years lifespan, at least the
states that do come off, you seethis little unroofed building
here, that when I first camehere that did actually have a
roof on it, and it collapsedafter the storm. But we've got a
local company, artisans of woodwho do fantastic Hobbit like
wood building with round woodtimber frame as well as
(18:31):
traditional timber frame.
They've very, very kindlyoffered to frame out that
building and clad it. And thenour builder will recycle the
slates off of the main buildingthat and put them on there and
make a lovely hide for you know,bat group members, potentially
down the line, maybe even small,quiet school groups, and such.
(18:51):
But there'll be a littlebuilding opposite the main
entrance where you can get afront row seat and watch our
glorious greater horseshoe batsemerging from the building.
Steve Roe (19:05):
That sounds great and quiet. I love the other Vincent
Wildlife Trust roost sites havecameras in has that discussion
happened in terms of puttingcameras in so that people can
view them from home on theinternet?
Scotty Dodd (19:16):
Absolutely. As I said at the moment, we've got
various trail cams in there.
That's more for monitoringpurposes. But we've already been
speaking with the National Trustto own nearby Petworth House
about the possibility of if wecould have CCTV in here, would
we be able to live stream butand then people pick it up when
(19:36):
they're visiting Petworth houseand be aware of the project and
get involved? But also yeah,there's the potential to stream
it to to websites, VWT'swebsite, that sort of thing.
Steve Roe (19:49):
So you realised she needed to secure this rooster
and take it off the open market.
How did you then kickstart thefundraising Scotty?
Scotty Dodd (19:57):
Yeah, it was a tricky process because So we
were given a deadline, and yetto actually get started and go
public, if you like and get themoney coming in. And we were
really slow, slow off the markfor for various unforeseen
reasons. So it was basicallyleaving aside no 6, 7, 8 months,
(20:20):
I forget how long, but the batgroups really, really rallied
round nationally, not not justthose in the southeast with an
interest in seeing the speciesspread back. But from far and
wide, we had some superb andsignificant donations, and we
really can't thank them enough.
We also had a substantialdonation from the people's trust
(20:43):
for endangered species, so greatto see another charity, putting
their money quite literallywhere their mouth is, in
supporting an endangered speciesproject that wasn't their own.
So yeah, good on them. Thumbsup.
Steve Roe (20:59):
So 100 grands needed?
How can people listening to theshow donate?
Scotty Dodd (21:04):
Actually, we need a little bit more than 100 grand.
So we managed to raise the 200kto purchase the building by the
deadline in February gone. Butwe did have to take out a little
bit of a loan just to make up ashortfall. And then as I say the
the estimates in quotes havegone up. So I think, in reality,
(21:27):
we're looking at a figure morelike 150k to 200k. If we want to
do everything, the bells andwhistles that we talked about
earlier, the hot boxes, the coolboxes, the cameras, you know, we
we don't have to do everythingif we realistically can't make
the money. But I like to thinkthat we can. I like to think
that even though times arereally really tough with rising
(21:49):
food costs and travel costs,there's still a lot of people
that love bats love wildlife ingeneral, and have great
generosity and we'll get behindthis campaign when they finally
get to hear about it.
Steve Roe (22:00):
Great stuff. And as that donation link on the VWT
website
Scotty Dodd (22:05):
yeah, there's there's actually a couple of
ways you can go about it. Theeasiest and simple way which is
for me is you can just GoogleSussex bat appeal and something
will come up. But VincentWildlife Trust website have got
[a] dedicated page it's got thevideo with Steve Moss that you
mentioned earlier, it's gotsomething we try and keep
(22:26):
updated, which is a history ofof finding the site and what's
been going on. So what's newthis year, YouTube links to
footage from from the routesthat we've got this year, so you
can get to see the babiesyourself. And then of course
it's got a link to makingdonations, or you can just
contact the VWT by mail bytelephone if you're feeling a
(22:52):
bit old school and you can talkto their finance team and you
can you can make a donation overthe phone backs check will
accept anything Sussex backgroup for our part, one of our
members set us up with anexcellent just giving page.
Again, that's got a little bitof history pictures of the bats.
And you can just click on abutton and make a donation
(23:13):
anonymously if you like or youcan leave an encouraging message
to try and galvanise others intointo parting with a few quid and
there's also the option to clickthe Gift Aid as well which means
we get a bit more money.
Steve Roe (23:28):
So we'll put all those links into the show notes
of this episode. So you guyslisten at home can find all
those links. Scottish shouldhave asked what's your
background in ecology and youknow, why are we doing the
surveys here and what's yourhistory with Sussex bat group?
Scotty Dodd (23:43):
I've been working in the ecological sector for
many years. I used to be workingon organic farms in Hereford
shear, and I'd never even heardof a countryside Ranger. And
then I met one thought, that'sbrilliant. He gets to drive
around in a Land Rover knowsloads about wildlife and gets to
(24:06):
do really cool things likehedgelaying copies management,
or cops management, and you knowall these other things depending
where you were dry stone wallingyou know it just sounded really
exciting. And this is kind ofpre internet was certainly pre
internet for me anyway, youknow, I was just living on a on
a farm. We didn't have muchtechnology beyond tractors to be
(24:28):
perfectly honest. And so Imanaged to find out that you
could go and do courses in thissort of thing, agricultural
colleges, and I was actuallyfrom the kind of Surrey area and
so the local college was therewould have been Merrist Wood.
And so I found out a bit moreand I could do I think it was a
three year course and I wasalready really into natural
(24:52):
history. I went out with theLedbury Natural History Society
which was full of people thatwere older than me that had
diverse interests in you Learnabout fungi plant galls got
pretty good at Botany andinsects and stuff like that no
one did bats I note in the groupand so I already had a pretty
good knowledge and so I went tothis Merrist Wood course I did
(25:14):
it for three years or whateverand I walked into my first post
is a ranger or a warden with theNational Trust on a beautiful
chalk downland. And that's whereI first started to learn a
little bit about that becauseNational Trust was a fantastic
organisation to to work for youyou wanted for nothing kit wise,
(25:34):
and equipment, but also theywere really good training and
personal development. And sothey'd run events like getting
involved with the Surrey batgroup taking oral wardens off to
DAPT Yun wharf or somewhere likethat, and, and we'd be there
with the tunable detectorslistening and watching
Daubenton's, sopranos, that sortof thing. And, yeah, it was from
(25:58):
there that I sort of flirtedwith bat groups, but I was
mainly a ranger, a practicalhabitat management kind of guy.
But then I started to get moreand more into invertebrates. And
I was referring out theinhabitants of plant corpse of
tiny tiny little wasps and allthe things that make the goals
(26:22):
so say the centipede wasp thatmakes a marble gall on our on an
oak tree, we'll have lots oflittle child said wasps, little
jewel like wasps, thatparasitize it and there's
parasites on the parasites andso on so forth. And I got quite
good at identifying thesethings. And then started looking
at other things like beetles,bugs, flies, and then other
(26:45):
invertebrates, spiders, woodlice, and so it's an almost
endless foreigner in in the UK,even though we're quite
depauperate compared to youknow, the tropics or something.
And so I ended up transitioningfrom being a ranger at Surry
Wildlife Trust to being theirdedicated in vertebrate
ecologist once you know once I'dgot good enough at it and that's
(27:08):
what I do now for a living youknow with a smattering of other
ecology surveyss as well becauseyou know, I'm a fairly good all
around botanist and an interestin in all other wildlife and so
yeah, I came to this site justto do what we call kind of a
preliminary ecological appraisaljust to see if there was any
(27:31):
quality to the site before theybuild on it and yeah, and here
we are.
Steve Roe (27:36):
Right so we're gonna have a look at these bats then
Scotty Dodd (27:39):
I'll get the camera
Steve Roe (27:45):
Scotty's just to moving some tarpaulin aside in
he's got a Canon camcorder I'massuming it's not normal camera
Unknown (27:55):
it's infrared. And he's got these little infrared
torches a good one with afisheye beam and then just did a
direct light. Else we wouldn'tsee anything
Steve Roe (28:05):
so Scotty is currently scanning the, the
inside of the roof along thealong the beams and rafters and
out. Can you see and just likethat as a roost of what's out
(28:26):
1-234-567...about 9, 9/10Greater horseshoe bats at the
far end
Unknown (28:33):
is getting tricky now.
Because in the earliest puppiesis getting quite large when you
literally doing the headcount.
Now to press record, and then Ican have a camera on the big
screen. And then this typicallittle thing that they do we
call it or Colin Morris calledit the Mexican wave where they
(28:54):
all simultaneously do a littleshiver.
Steve Roe (28:58):
And they're not really bothered by I mean, they
must know that we're here. Butthey're not bothered at all, are
they?
Unknown (29:04):
It's him again. And that's it, we just sort of talk
quietly, but in normal voicesbecause whispering is is more
likely to produce ultrasonicnoises, you know, sharp little
hisses. And so they're notbothered. They're not even done
a little fly around to check usout.
Steve Roe (29:25):
And they're all clustered in between two rafters
just in the one gap far into thebarn right now the rich.
Presumably, that's where it'sgoing to be warmest with all the
higher collects in there.
Unknown (29:38):
Yeah, so we're in early evening. Now it's cooled down.
It's not been as warm as it wasyesterday. So they're actually,
as you say, closer to the ridge,whereas when it came a little
while ago, and it was blazinghot sunshine. They were actually
sort of about call it threerungs down, okay, and where it
(29:58):
was just that little bit cool.
And when it's really quite cold,they go into this roof or hit
here. And they go right down theother end of the building. And
as you can see, so that's thedoor height there and a door
height, probably what aboutseven foot, you're talking six
to seven foot, you're talkingmaybe another eight to 10 foot
above that. So it's a ladderjob. And as I said earlier, you
(30:21):
don't really want to be climbingwith ladders because although
most of the bats might be atthat, and you've got this little
area over here where you couldhave one or two bats tucked
away, yeah. So we'll leave themto bitmap
Steve Roe (30:38):
stuff, we'll wait for it to get dark and do a count.
(31:18):
It was great meeting Scott inthe summer, and I want to say
thanks to him for taking timeout of his day to sit down with
me to record the interview. Asyou heard lots of money is
needed to stop the building fromfalling into disrepair and to
make improvements which will getthe rest every chance of success
and growing in the coming years.
If you'd like to make adonation, the first link in the
show notes will take you to theJustGiving page, which also
includes a video of the site andthe roof so you can see the
(31:40):
building for yourself. There arealso other links to be found in
the show notes, including thevideo featuring the naturalist
and author Stephen Moss. Now,just before we go, we've had a
voicemail left by a listener.
Last week I mentioned we wantyou to get in touch and that's
what Wendy did after listeningto that last episode.
Wendy (31:57):
Hi, Steve. It's Wendy.
Just to say my initialfascination with bats began a
few years ago when we rented aproperty in Mottisfont,
Hampshire from the NationalTrust, and we were informed we
had a barbastelle maternityroost in the loft. I then
quickly went out and purchasedmy first bat recorder, which was
(32:20):
a bat baton and quickly followedby the echo meter touch several
1000 recordings later, I'm stillcompletely hooked, and several
books later and listening toyour podcasts. We then recently
moved to seemed in Wiltshire andthis July, and within two weeks
(32:43):
of moving in, I was making a cupof tapes, it was 4am. And to my
delight, there was probably 20soprano pipistrelles swarming
outside of their roost entrance.
I was so so thrilled so excited.
I have not really slept muchthis summer, I've been keeping
my eye on them. recording them.
(33:07):
I have posted lots of my slowmotion recordings on Twitter.
And that that has got to be myhighlight so far. I'm so
thrilled feel so protective. Andjust love listening to your
podcasts.
Steve Roe (33:20):
Thanks so much for getting in touch Wendy. I had no
idea that Mottisfont was such animportant site for barbastelles
who knows batch that may well bemaking a visit there in the not
so distant future. Please do getin touch with the show to tell
us about your bats. A specialbat sighting you had this year
or a site you think everyoneshould visit to go and watch
bats. Whether you're new to batsor a seasoned bat lover, we
(33:41):
really want to hear from you. Sodo get in touch. The voicemail
link is in the show notes. Anddon't worry, you can hear your
message back and we record it ifyou don't like it before sending
it to us. Messages can be up to90 seconds long and we can't
wait to hear from you. We'reback in two weeks time at a
Tudor manor house above theriver Wye in the Peak District
See you then.
Hello and welcome to BatChat from the Bat
Conservation Trust. This podcastis for anyone who loves bats. We
bring you the stories from theworld of bat conservation, from
the people on the ground doingwork that furthers our
understanding of these magicalcreatures. There's a lot of
information and experience outthere and our aim is to bring it
right to you. I'm Steve Roe; I'man ecologist and a trustee of
(00:30):
the Bat Conservation Trust.
Don't forget you can join theconversation online using the
hashtag BatChat that's all oneword. Later on, we'll hear from
BatChat listener Wendy who tellsus about the bats she's living
alongside. But first this week,we come to you from a secret
location near Midhurst in WestSussex, recorded in July with
Scotty Dodd from the Sussex batgroup. We're sat in a small
(00:50):
block of woodland at the bottomof a dell on a leaf covered
track leading to a rundownbuilding hidden amongst the
trees. In 2019, Scotty madeprobably one of the bat groups
most important discoveries, thefirst greater horseshoe bat
maternity roost in Sussex for100 years. As the evening breeze
moves through the beech treesaround us, he starts off by
taking us through the story ofhow he discovered the roost that
(01:12):
we're both sat in front ofduring this interview.
Scotty Dodd (01:17):
Okay, yeah, so as you say, I found it in 2019, it
was still winter, so February,February, the 14th. And at the
time, it was just a single bat.
And obviously, I told people inthe bat group, Tony Hudson, and
Martin Phyllis. And the generalconsensus of opinion was that
we've occasionally seen thesebats turn up in structures
(01:40):
before, and they've usuallydisappeared by May, and we've no
idea where they go. But we thinkthey might gather somewhere for
a small maternity roost. So atthat point, I started putting
passive bat detectors, trailcameras, that sort of thing in
the building, so we couldmonitor whether activity went up
(02:00):
or down. That year, the batsweren't particularly visible,
it's quite a large building. Andthe there's areas of the roof
void that you just can't viewinto without being very
disturbing, using ladders, thatsort of thing. Which if it was a
maternity roost we wouldn't wantto be doing throughout the
summer, and you know, causingthe bats to abandon the
(02:22):
building. And so we were doingeverything very carefully. And
all that we got in the firstyear was some tantalising
ultrasound calls, which we sentto Margaret Andrews, who's done
an awful lot of work on greaterand lesser horseshoe bats over
the years. And it took us sometime and deliberation. But
(02:43):
eventually she got back to us.
And said, I've measured and remeasured your calls for a number
of times set about it, thoughtabout it gone back to it. And
now I'm absolutely sure thatwhat you've recorded is a mother
carrying the baby, and someother evidence of juvenile
calls. And then she said,categorically, when we talked
(03:06):
about numbers of bats beingcaught on the trail cam, rather
than going down to zero, we werestarting to see two, three,
maybe four on the trail cam, butthe image isn't great. And she
said, Well, bats will only begathering at a building that
this time of year and makingthese sorts of social calls, if
it's a maternity roost. And ofcourse, we were seeing on the
(03:27):
emergence surveys, you know,more and more bats starting to
emerge from the building until Ithink we had a maximum in the
first year of five or six. In2020, we had a much luckier time
we still had all your recordingequipment in there. But the bats
were good enough to spend a lotof time roosting at the end of
(03:48):
the building, where we couldview them from from a real
window. So we were literallystood outside of the bat roost,
just filming in through a grill.
And it was then that we made thediscovery of the first baby and
which then within a few weeksbecame a cluster of babies or
pups. And yeah, we've we've goneon from there really.
Steve Roe (04:13):
So what's the largest counts then of these horseshoes
you've had so far?
Scotty Dodd (04:17):
Well, in 2020, we had six adult females that had
three pups and we think we lostone of the pups to a tawny owl
we had some trail cam footage ofof the owl up in the roof void
being swarmed by the bats andwhat looked like a limp bat wing
(04:37):
between the the rafters and sureenough, the the subsequent count
I think we only had eight comingout instead of nine. So we we
think we lost one nature red intooth and claw. This year, I
think 2021 We didn't have asmuch luck but this year we've
had a maximum of nine adults andAnd so far, and we need to check
(05:01):
again this evening. So far we'vehad five pups. But also, even in
the winter hibernation surveys,we've been having record
numbers, Nick Grey and his teamrecorded across the several
tunnels that they survey, atotal of 13 bats, and that was
in conjunction with DanielWhitby, who was going to some of
(05:24):
the structures where he knew thebats overwintered as well. So
all the Sussex bat ecologistshave been coordinating so we can
get the best information on theestimated population size.
Steve Roe (05:36):
And like you say you've been working with other
ecologists who suspected thatthere was a population here, how
many of the different sitesroughly, have you been recording
these bats in the winter then?
Scotty Dodd (05:47):
The several tunnels I do I do do some of the tunnel
checks myself, but I've not beento all of them. And Tony is
probably best best placed toanswer that. Because, you know,
he's been doing it since sincethe bat group began. But yeah,
they're, they use several of thetunnels, some more than others.
And then there's, as I say, acouple of other structures that
(06:08):
other ecologists are aware of,as well.
Steve Roe (06:12):
So, I mean, we've seen this, this has attracted a
lot of media attention and theheadlines that's been grabbed by
everyone is, this is the firstmaternity roost of greater
horseshoe bats in Sussex for atleast 100 years. You've
attracted lots of mediaattention with this good news
story. And you've even got thebroadcaster and author Stephen
Moss involved. Why is this roostso significant for for the South
(06:35):
East of England?
Scotty Dodd (06:36):
Well it's a pioneering roost. Greater
horseshoe bats suffered amassive decline. We've all heard
some horror stories about, youknow, the catastrophic number of
casualties at say, Creech manorin Dorset. You know, going back
probably 50 years. And thenumbers drop somewhere in the
(06:57):
90%, I think was it. And theywere completely lost from well,
as a breeding species. As far aswe knew from the southeast of
England. The the only records wewere really getting was
occasional individuals or asmall number of individuals in
winter hibernation sites. Butthe feeling was that it was
(07:19):
possible they could be breeding.
So So to find that, you know,it's absolute luck. You know,
it's a needle in a haystackthing. But yeah, as luck would
have it, the the building theywere using, came came under my
nose.
Steve Roe (07:34):
And when she had found that discovery, and Maggie
Andrews had confirmed it wasindeed a maternity roost, how
quickly did you move to protectthe site and the bats and make
the landowner aware of thesignificance?
Scotty Dodd (07:46):
Once again, we were very, very lucky. The landowner
was an executor. And he was justsorting out the sort of will of
the guy who owned this, and toall intents and purposes had
been an absentee landlord, hadbought the place and not really
done anything with it in his30/40 years of tenure, or
(08:06):
whatever it was. And so theydidn't really have a great
vested interest. There was moreland within the parcel that we
don't own. And there's anothersort of two and a half acres,
and then there were variousmeadows and other bits and bobs.
And the executor had come upwith a plan a housing scheme, if
you like, within the area, andthat that just didn't even get
(08:31):
off the ground. So they werelooking at converting this
building were at into aresidence. And, you know, we
sought advice from NaturalEngland, would they even can see
to letting that go ahead. As ithappened. Yes, they would,
because I think they had theforesight to see that if no one
did anything, the building wasgoing to fall down. I mean, as
(08:54):
soon as we discovered the placethieves came and stole a lead
off the roof. And from thatpoint in, it started to
deteriorate. You know, it'squite an old building. It was
built in, in around the 1830s1840s. And so the the internal
construction is lath and plasterrather than, you know, modern
plaster boards, that was gettingsaturated and falling down in
(09:14):
huge chunks, which was lettingthe light into the bats roosting
area. It was it was changing theairflow, so many things going
against it. So we had to come upwith a plan. But I think that
the executor at the time,realised that was going to be
not only a long but potentiallyvery expensive road if he had to
(09:36):
provide roosting space for thebats within the building or an
alternative. And so I sort ofsaid, well, what if I could find
someone who might be interestedin in buying it as is just for
conservation, and we settled ona price as everyone should know
by now that's been following acampaign that was £200k and we
(09:57):
we are in the heart of the SouthDowns and National Park. So
land, buildings premium. And wewent around a few organisations,
it was a very, very difficulttime, the pandemic had just kind
of come upon us, people didn'tknow what was happening and, and
no one wanted to take the risk.
But Vincent Wildlife Trust, wereinterested and did take that
(10:19):
risk. And now we're working inpartnership as a bat group. And
Vincent Wildlife Trust to toraise the funds needed. Now
we've purchased the building, wenow need to repair it and
there's a lot of repairs,there's there's damage to one of
the walls, the roof needscompletely replacing and anyone
who's done any building workduring the pandemic, will be
(10:41):
acutely aware how costs haverisen for doing this, you know,
everything from batons to slatesis a lot more expensive than it
was two, three years ago.
Steve Roe (10:53):
And you've done you've answered my next
question, you know, what, whatplans are there to improve the
site? Are you going to improveany of the internal features for
the bats to use, as well asmaking the building watertight?
Etc?
Scotty Dodd (11:05):
Yeah, so once we've made it weatherproof, there's
other things we need to do. Butwe need to do it carefully. And
we need to do it incrementally.
So at the moment, it's abeautiful building, it's it's
saying we can't show it to youon an audio,
Steve Roe (11:20):
I was gonna say do you want to do an audio
description to describe whatwe're set in front of them.
Scotty Dodd (11:23):
So it's, it's a classic textbook, greater
horseshoe bat building. It's alarge old Victorian stable block
made out of local stone withbrick coins, and a pitch slate
roof. But it wasn't just any oldstables for any old nags. This
(11:44):
was for a polo team. And thelandscape around this has
changed considerably. You know,we're set, essentially in an in
a woodland, we but you see howthe land slopes up away from us,
we're kind of in a dell here.
And you'll notice if you can seethrough all the nettles and
whatnot over here now, that isactually quite flat along the
top. And that's where they usedto I'm told exercise, the horses
(12:06):
just walking around just just towarm them up. And then yeah, and
then they had out in the widerarea, there were various other
training grounds and polo fieldsand whatnot. It's got excellent
flight and access via the maindoor. And then there's several
windows that aren't blocked bygrills or anything else. And the
(12:29):
bats are quite curious. They'redown the far end of the building
are up in the roof void. Andthere's many places where they
could egress from the building,but they choose to fly up and
down the corridor, which somepeople call light sampling,
Margaret Andrews call it socialflight. And they always come out
the front door. Every time thesebats have manners, they'll try
(12:52):
and confuse either fly back intothe windows, but then they'll
always come back out the dooragain. But because we've got
problems with predators, we'vehad cats, owls, humans, all
coming into the bat roost, weneed to do something to as I
say, gradually start blockingthese exits off so predators and
people can't get in there. Butthe bats can still get in and
(13:14):
out and aren't put off. So wedon't want to do anything too
quickly. Just putting it off andleaving them a little letterbox.
We need to do it slowly,probably over a couple of years.
Steve Roe (13:26):
And you recommend those sorts of improvements, the
roof size may well increase overtime.
Scotty Dodd (13:30):
Well, I think once it's weather tight, once it's
secure, that gives them the bestchance but there's so much more
we can do. And it all reallydepends on how generous the
public are, how generous thegrant funds are, and how much we
can raise because to give themthe best chance and to enhance
or maximise on colony growth. Imean, and as you well know as a
(13:53):
bat lover, you know bats ingeneral have about one younger
year. So it's always going to beslow when you're you're starting
with with only nine bats and ofcourse greater horseshoe bats
can take four or five years toreach sexual maturity. So they,
you know, a female pup born thisyear, won't be producing for for
(14:14):
several more years. So it'sgoing to be a slow game. But if
we can afford to put in heatersand hot boxes, and other heat
variations, say cool cool boxesor cool rooms, cooler areas
within the roost. We can makethe roost better for the bats at
different times of years andmaximise on colour comment and
(14:37):
growth at the time when itmatters in summer.
Steve Roe (14:40):
And that's what horses need is that they want
something that's got a range oftemperatures to be suitable for
both summer and winter.
Scotty Dodd (14:46):
Yes, I mean they have got the hibernation tunnels
as well but there's a potentialhere for us to give them another
safe option. I mean, because thetunnels are great but I mean I'm
I'm aware that they get brokeninto here and there and That
must be quite disturbing for thebats, particularly if it's cold
winter, not that we're havingtoo many of them. But yeah, we
just want to give them as manyoptions as possible.
Steve Roe (15:08):
So if they're here in this building, are they then
also somewhere else nearby, youknow, is there another rooster
or another population even,
Scotty Dodd (15:16):
I would be surprised if there was another
breeding population Never saynever. And it'd be wonderful if
they did have an alternative. Weare aware of other structures,
buildings, undergroundstructures, and of course, the
the old railway tunnels thatthey use at different times of
year. And certainly, some ofthese are what you might call
(15:38):
spring and autumn transitionalroofs. So it can always be a bit
quiet here in around April,early May. But we've got an
inkling by working with otherbat ecologists of where they are
or might be. And and there's agood spread these sites across
Sussex. There's also otherstructures that we now have, the
(16:00):
less important, in fact, there'sone here on another part of the
site. That's just a nightrooster feeding roost. So so
we've got evidence that they goin there, they their beetles,
eat their mouths, and undo theirdroppings, etc.
Steve Roe (16:15):
And what did it feel like when you walked into this
building and saw horseshoes? Youknow, what was that feeling like
to discover the roost?
Scotty Dodd (16:21):
A bit overwhelming to be perfectly honest, you
know, I don't consider myself abat expert at the level of Tony
Hutson and whatnot. And so I hadmy infrared camera with me, I
got a good zoomed in image ofthis bat. And it's almost like
your brains telling you itcannot be a horseshoe bat, you
(16:44):
must be mistaken, it must besomething else. So I got it
home, blew it up on the bigscreen. And I was, you know, a
certain as I could be, but Istill sent it to my mentor
Martin Phyllis, and said,Please, Martin, you've just got
a double check, because he hadlots of experience of Horseshoe
bats. He's another back groupmember who's been doing it for
(17:05):
years and going into thechannels for years. So he was
very familiar. And so that'sgreat. He goes, Yes, Well done,
Scotty. But you know, at thatpoint, again, it was still well,
let's wait and see what happens.
But let's not get too excitedjust yet.
Steve Roe (17:20):
And how quickly do you need to raise those funds,
then?
Scotty Dodd (17:25):
Well, the bats start to leave the building
after the maternity season. Andso sort of September October, we
should in theory, be able tostart doing some of the work.
And as I say we're going tophase it, I mean, the most
important thing is going to bestructural stuff. And getting
the roofs got to come offcompletely. All the timbers
(17:47):
replaced. And then it's goingback on with all new slates.
We've got slates here, we couldreuse them. But you know, they
were put up there in the 1840sperhaps. And so you know, how
much life have they got left inthem, a lot of them are broken
and crumbly. So VWT think it'sbest just to put all new and
(18:07):
then then you know, it's got 100years lifespan, at least the
states that do come off, you seethis little unroofed building
here, that when I first camehere that did actually have a
roof on it, and it collapsedafter the storm. But we've got a
local company, artisans of woodwho do fantastic Hobbit like
wood building with round woodtimber frame as well as
(18:31):
traditional timber frame.
They've very, very kindlyoffered to frame out that
building and clad it. And thenour builder will recycle the
slates off of the main buildingthat and put them on there and
make a lovely hide for you know,bat group members, potentially
down the line, maybe even small,quiet school groups, and such.
(18:51):
But there'll be a littlebuilding opposite the main
entrance where you can get afront row seat and watch our
glorious greater horseshoe batsemerging from the building.
Steve Roe (19:05):
That sounds great and quiet. I love the other Vincent
Wildlife Trust roost sites havecameras in has that discussion
happened in terms of puttingcameras in so that people can
view them from home on theinternet?
Scotty Dodd (19:16):
Absolutely. As I said at the moment, we've got
various trail cams in there.
That's more for monitoringpurposes. But we've already been
speaking with the National Trustto own nearby Petworth House
about the possibility of if wecould have CCTV in here, would
we be able to live stream butand then people pick it up when
(19:36):
they're visiting Petworth houseand be aware of the project and
get involved? But also yeah,there's the potential to stream
it to to websites, VWT'swebsite, that sort of thing.
Steve Roe (19:49):
So you realised she needed to secure this rooster
and take it off the open market.
How did you then kickstart thefundraising Scotty?
Scotty Dodd (19:57):
Yeah, it was a tricky process because So we
were given a deadline, and yetto actually get started and go
public, if you like and get themoney coming in. And we were
really slow, slow off the markfor for various unforeseen
reasons. So it was basicallyleaving aside no 6, 7, 8 months,
(20:20):
I forget how long, but the batgroups really, really rallied
round nationally, not not justthose in the southeast with an
interest in seeing the speciesspread back. But from far and
wide, we had some superb andsignificant donations, and we
really can't thank them enough.
We also had a substantialdonation from the people's trust
(20:43):
for endangered species, so greatto see another charity, putting
their money quite literallywhere their mouth is, in
supporting an endangered speciesproject that wasn't their own.
So yeah, good on them. Thumbsup.
Steve Roe (20:59):
So 100 grands needed?
How can people listening to theshow donate?
Scotty Dodd (21:04):
Actually, we need a little bit more than 100 grand.
So we managed to raise the 200kto purchase the building by the
deadline in February gone. Butwe did have to take out a little
bit of a loan just to make up ashortfall. And then as I say the
the estimates in quotes havegone up. So I think, in reality,
(21:27):
we're looking at a figure morelike 150k to 200k. If we want to
do everything, the bells andwhistles that we talked about
earlier, the hot boxes, the coolboxes, the cameras, you know, we
we don't have to do everythingif we realistically can't make
the money. But I like to thinkthat we can. I like to think
that even though times arereally really tough with rising
(21:49):
food costs and travel costs,there's still a lot of people
that love bats love wildlife ingeneral, and have great
generosity and we'll get behindthis campaign when they finally
get to hear about it.
Steve Roe (22:00):
Great stuff. And as that donation link on the VWT
website
Scotty Dodd (22:05):
yeah, there's there's actually a couple of
ways you can go about it. Theeasiest and simple way which is
for me is you can just GoogleSussex bat appeal and something
will come up. But VincentWildlife Trust website have got
[a] dedicated page it's got thevideo with Steve Moss that you
mentioned earlier, it's gotsomething we try and keep
(22:26):
updated, which is a history ofof finding the site and what's
been going on. So what's newthis year, YouTube links to
footage from from the routesthat we've got this year, so you
can get to see the babiesyourself. And then of course
it's got a link to makingdonations, or you can just
contact the VWT by mail bytelephone if you're feeling a
(22:52):
bit old school and you can talkto their finance team and you
can you can make a donation overthe phone backs check will
accept anything Sussex backgroup for our part, one of our
members set us up with anexcellent just giving page.
Again, that's got a little bitof history pictures of the bats.
And you can just click on abutton and make a donation
(23:13):
anonymously if you like or youcan leave an encouraging message
to try and galvanise others intointo parting with a few quid and
there's also the option to clickthe Gift Aid as well which means
we get a bit more money.
Steve Roe (23:28):
So we'll put all those links into the show notes
of this episode. So you guyslisten at home can find all
those links. Scottish shouldhave asked what's your
background in ecology and youknow, why are we doing the
surveys here and what's yourhistory with Sussex bat group?
Scotty Dodd (23:43):
I've been working in the ecological sector for
many years. I used to be workingon organic farms in Hereford
shear, and I'd never even heardof a countryside Ranger. And
then I met one thought, that'sbrilliant. He gets to drive
around in a Land Rover knowsloads about wildlife and gets to
(24:06):
do really cool things likehedgelaying copies management,
or cops management, and you knowall these other things depending
where you were dry stone wallingyou know it just sounded really
exciting. And this is kind ofpre internet was certainly pre
internet for me anyway, youknow, I was just living on a on
a farm. We didn't have muchtechnology beyond tractors to be
(24:28):
perfectly honest. And so Imanaged to find out that you
could go and do courses in thissort of thing, agricultural
colleges, and I was actuallyfrom the kind of Surrey area and
so the local college was therewould have been Merrist Wood.
And so I found out a bit moreand I could do I think it was a
three year course and I wasalready really into natural
(24:52):
history. I went out with theLedbury Natural History Society
which was full of people thatwere older than me that had
diverse interests in you Learnabout fungi plant galls got
pretty good at Botany andinsects and stuff like that no
one did bats I note in the groupand so I already had a pretty
good knowledge and so I went tothis Merrist Wood course I did
(25:14):
it for three years or whateverand I walked into my first post
is a ranger or a warden with theNational Trust on a beautiful
chalk downland. And that's whereI first started to learn a
little bit about that becauseNational Trust was a fantastic
organisation to to work for youyou wanted for nothing kit wise,
(25:34):
and equipment, but also theywere really good training and
personal development. And sothey'd run events like getting
involved with the Surrey batgroup taking oral wardens off to
DAPT Yun wharf or somewhere likethat, and, and we'd be there
with the tunable detectorslistening and watching
Daubenton's, sopranos, that sortof thing. And, yeah, it was from
(25:58):
there that I sort of flirtedwith bat groups, but I was
mainly a ranger, a practicalhabitat management kind of guy.
But then I started to get moreand more into invertebrates. And
I was referring out theinhabitants of plant corpse of
tiny tiny little wasps and allthe things that make the goals
(26:22):
so say the centipede wasp thatmakes a marble gall on our on an
oak tree, we'll have lots oflittle child said wasps, little
jewel like wasps, thatparasitize it and there's
parasites on the parasites andso on so forth. And I got quite
good at identifying thesethings. And then started looking
at other things like beetles,bugs, flies, and then other
(26:45):
invertebrates, spiders, woodlice, and so it's an almost
endless foreigner in in the UK,even though we're quite
depauperate compared to youknow, the tropics or something.
And so I ended up transitioningfrom being a ranger at Surry
Wildlife Trust to being theirdedicated in vertebrate
ecologist once you know once I'dgot good enough at it and that's
(27:08):
what I do now for a living youknow with a smattering of other
ecology surveyss as well becauseyou know, I'm a fairly good all
around botanist and an interestin in all other wildlife and so
yeah, I came to this site justto do what we call kind of a
preliminary ecological appraisaljust to see if there was any
(27:31):
quality to the site before theybuild on it and yeah, and here
we are.
Steve Roe (27:36):
Right so we're gonna have a look at these bats then
Scotty Dodd (27:39):
I'll get the camera
Steve Roe (27:45):
Scotty's just to moving some tarpaulin aside in
he's got a Canon camcorder I'massuming it's not normal camera
Unknown (27:55):
it's infrared. And he's got these little infrared
torches a good one with afisheye beam and then just did a
direct light. Else we wouldn'tsee anything
Steve Roe (28:05):
so Scotty is currently scanning the, the
inside of the roof along thealong the beams and rafters and
out. Can you see and just likethat as a roost of what's out
(28:26):
1-234-567...about 9, 9/10Greater horseshoe bats at the
far end
Unknown (28:33):
is getting tricky now.
Because in the earliest puppiesis getting quite large when you
literally doing the headcount.
Now to press record, and then Ican have a camera on the big
screen. And then this typicallittle thing that they do we
call it or Colin Morris calledit the Mexican wave where they
(28:54):
all simultaneously do a littleshiver.
Steve Roe (28:58):
And they're not really bothered by I mean, they
must know that we're here. Butthey're not bothered at all, are
they?
Unknown (29:04):
It's him again. And that's it, we just sort of talk
quietly, but in normal voicesbecause whispering is is more
likely to produce ultrasonicnoises, you know, sharp little
hisses. And so they're notbothered. They're not even done
a little fly around to check usout.
Steve Roe (29:25):
And they're all clustered in between two rafters
just in the one gap far into thebarn right now the rich.
Presumably, that's where it'sgoing to be warmest with all the
higher collects in there.
Unknown (29:38):
Yeah, so we're in early evening. Now it's cooled down.
It's not been as warm as it wasyesterday. So they're actually,
as you say, closer to the ridge,whereas when it came a little
while ago, and it was blazinghot sunshine. They were actually
sort of about call it threerungs down, okay, and where it
(29:58):
was just that little bit cool.
And when it's really quite cold,they go into this roof or hit
here. And they go right down theother end of the building. And
as you can see, so that's thedoor height there and a door
height, probably what aboutseven foot, you're talking six
to seven foot, you're talkingmaybe another eight to 10 foot
above that. So it's a ladderjob. And as I said earlier, you
(30:21):
don't really want to be climbingwith ladders because although
most of the bats might be atthat, and you've got this little
area over here where you couldhave one or two bats tucked
away, yeah. So we'll leave themto bitmap
Steve Roe (30:38):
stuff, we'll wait for it to get dark and do a count.
(31:18):
It was great meeting Scott inthe summer, and I want to say
thanks to him for taking timeout of his day to sit down with
me to record the interview. Asyou heard lots of money is
needed to stop the building fromfalling into disrepair and to
make improvements which will getthe rest every chance of success
and growing in the coming years.
If you'd like to make adonation, the first link in the
show notes will take you to theJustGiving page, which also
includes a video of the site andthe roof so you can see the
(31:40):
building for yourself. There arealso other links to be found in
the show notes, including thevideo featuring the naturalist
and author Stephen Moss. Now,just before we go, we've had a
voicemail left by a listener.
Last week I mentioned we wantyou to get in touch and that's
what Wendy did after listeningto that last episode.
Wendy (31:57):
Hi, Steve. It's Wendy.
Just to say my initialfascination with bats began a
few years ago when we rented aproperty in Mottisfont,
Hampshire from the NationalTrust, and we were informed we
had a barbastelle maternityroost in the loft. I then
quickly went out and purchasedmy first bat recorder, which was
(32:20):
a bat baton and quickly followedby the echo meter touch several
1000 recordings later, I'm stillcompletely hooked, and several
books later and listening toyour podcasts. We then recently
moved to seemed in Wiltshire andthis July, and within two weeks
(32:43):
of moving in, I was making a cupof tapes, it was 4am. And to my
delight, there was probably 20soprano pipistrelles swarming
outside of their roost entrance.
I was so so thrilled so excited.
I have not really slept muchthis summer, I've been keeping
my eye on them. recording them.
(33:07):
I have posted lots of my slowmotion recordings on Twitter.
And that that has got to be myhighlight so far. I'm so
thrilled feel so protective. Andjust love listening to your
podcasts.
Steve Roe (33:20):
Thanks so much for getting in touch Wendy. I had no
idea that Mottisfont was such animportant site for barbastelles
who knows batch that may well bemaking a visit there in the not
so distant future. Please do getin touch with the show to tell
us about your bats. A specialbat sighting you had this year
or a site you think everyoneshould visit to go and watch
bats. Whether you're new to batsor a seasoned bat lover, we
(33:41):
really want to hear from you. Sodo get in touch. The voicemail
link is in the show notes. Anddon't worry, you can hear your
message back and we record it ifyou don't like it before sending
it to us. Messages can be up to90 seconds long and we can't
wait to hear from you. We'reback in two weeks time at a
Tudor manor house above theriver Wye in the Peak District
See you then.
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