Could the Wildcat Work for Wales?

Annual Report and Financial Statements — December 2023

Vincent Wildlife Trust has just published its Annual Report for 2023. This report gives an overview of the past year’s highlights, its projects, its partners and its audited financial statements.

Photo: Greater horseshoe bat with pup ©Daniel Hargreaves

Henry Schofield, Vida Zrnčić, Stuart Newson, Daniela Hamidović, Chris Damant. A review of the conservation status, distribution and ecology of Plecotus kolombatovici Ðulić, 1980, with additional new information on its echolocation, roosting and foraging from Lokrum Island, Croatia. Journal of Bat Research in the Balkans Godina VIII, Br. 2, 2023

Plecotus kolombatovici Ðulić, 1980 was given full species status in 2008. However, it was still being combined with a sister species P. gaisleri until 2020, which caused confusion in determining its true distribution and status. Studies of the roosting and foraging of this species are very limited, and little has been reported on its echolocation calls.

In this paper, we review the history of the identification of this species, its current distributional data, and former studies of its roosting and foraging ecology. In addition, we present new data on roosting, foraging and echolocation of this species from the Croatian island of Lokrum, and discuss the status and conservation needs of P. kolombatovici more widely.

Key words: Chiroptera, Plecotus kolombatovici, ecology, echolocation, Lokrum island

Photo: Kolombatovici’s bat ©Daniel Hargreaves

Non-invasive methods for monitoring weasels: emerging technologies and priorities for future research (2024) DS Jachowski et al

This report looks at how emerging non-invasive methods for monitoring the elusive weasel may help to more accurately assess populations and distribution across the world in order to develop management actions.

Photo: Weasel ©Robert Cruickshanks

VWT’s Newsletter for 2023

This newsletter highlights the work of 2023 and celebrates the achievements for mammal conservation in Britain, Ireland and further afield during this year.

Photo: Irish stoat ©Carrie Crowley

O’Malley KD, et al. (2023). An acoustic-based method for locating maternity colonies of rare woodland bats

Locating colonies of rare bats can be a time consuming process, as it is often difficult to know where to focus survey effort. However, identifying peaks of bat activity via acoustic monitoring may provide insights into whether a colony is locally present, and help screen out sites with low potential. Using a triage approach, we developed a survey methodology for locating colonies of the woodland-specialist barbastelle bat (Barbastella barbastellus). We investigated whether woodland occupancy by a colony could be predicted by acoustic data, and assessed the influence of survey effort (number of acoustic detectors deployed) on detectability.

PeerJ11:e15951

Annual Report and Financial Statements – December 2022

Vincent Wildlife Trust has just published its Annual Report for 2022. This report gives an overview of the past year’s highlights, its projects, its partners and its audited financial statements.

Photo: Pine marten ©Jason Hornblow

Ternenge Apaa et al. (2023) Sarbecoviruses of British horseshoe bats; sequence variation and epidemiology

Horseshoe bats are the natural hosts of the Sarbecovirus subgenus that includes SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2. Despite the devastating impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is still little known about the underlying epidemiology and virology of sarbecoviruses in their natural hosts, leaving large gaps in our pandemic preparedness. Dr Samantha Bremner-Harrison, VWT’s Head of Conservation, has contributed to the research and this paper, which describes the results of PCR testing for sarbecoviruses in the two horseshoe bat species (Rhinolophus hipposideros and R. ferrumequinum) present in Great Britain, collected in 2021–22 during the peak of COVID-19 pandemic.

Photo: Lesser horseshoe bat (Rhinolophus hipposideros) ©Frank Greenaway

Bavin, D. et al. (2023) Stakeholder perspectives of the prospect of lynx (Lynx lynx) reintroduction in Scotland.

Marina Bollo Palacios et al. (2023) Exclusion of barn owls Tyto alba from a greater horseshoe bat Rhinolophus ferrumequinum roost in Devon, UK.

The greater horseshoe bat Rhinolophus ferrumequinum is a rare species in the UK that relies heavily on undisturbed stone buildings in which to breed. Barn owls Tyto alba are also a protected species that roost and raise their broods in similar places. This overlap in roosting requirements can lead to barn owls moving into buildings containing well-established greater horseshoe bat maternity colonies. This in turn could result in disturbance and abandonment of the building by the bats. Such an event occurred at one of the largest greater horseshoe bat roosts in the UK in 2018 when the colony deserted the roost after barn owls moved in. In this paper, we describe measures used to exclude the owls while retaining access for the bats, to encourage the colony to return.

Conservation Evidence, 20, 8 – 12  ISSN 1758-2067 8

Photo: Hibernating greater horseshoe bat ©Daniel Hargreaves