Dancersend

By Dancersend

Glis glis damage

I was checking our old nest boxes today to see if any could be repaired and re-used. These have been damaged by a rather interesting and exasperating mammal for which our nature reserve is priviledged (!) to be the UK hotspot. The Glis glis or Fat dormouse/Edible dormouse was released (by accident or intention?) from the Rothschild mansion in Tring Park in 1902. It has since spread to around a 30 mile radius of Tring, but is at its highest concentrations in suitable local mature deciduous woodland. We have stopped using most of our bird nesting boxes and bat boxes over the last couple of years because most turned out to be providing homes for Glis. It is an interesting creature, sometimes known as Seven-sleeper because in hibernates from October to April or even longer. In the four or five moths it is active it damages trees by stripping the bark, causes havoc in lofts, chews through electrical cables (in houses and cars!) and, in our case, denies decent homes to birds and bats. More about this difficult character in future blips.

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