A des res for newts?

[Kayleigh]

Originally Posted by animartco

lOOK at these dreadful pictures of bomb sites people. Haven't you got eyes? Can't you see the churned up tyre tracks in what was once a habitat for helpless little animals? Don't believe these so called wild life managers. They get payed for the work they do and that is the ONLY reason they do it.
And what is the end result? A little pile of nettles on a flat field. Only two plant species visible!
Reservess shoild be created and then LEFT ALONE, apart from a warden whose job it should be to ensure that THERE IS no disturbance.

All the level headed novice and experts alike can clearly see that this person has not got realistic views.
Does anyone on this site agree with what she is on about..
These are not views of a rational thinking sane person.

[Dogghound]

Originally Posted by Kayleigh

Does anyone on this site agree with what she is on about..

I respect that everyone is entitled to their own opinion. In my opinion this is an informative thread which offers practical advice for the conservation of amphibians. This group is known to be declining in areas, more rapidly in some species than others. In a lot of cases the reason is the degredation of habitats, it is pivotal to provide overwintering habitat as well as breeding habitat for this group. The designs and hard work put into this by the members on this thread should be commended. Myself and many other wabbers spend large amounts of their time usually voluntary providing habitat management to a whole variety of animals (and plants) which is making a real difference.

However I find it unacceptable for someone to come on here and make a series of degrading comments which are untrue than give out advice that is potentially damaging to wildlife and argue about it. I am well aware that not everybody knows everything. I dont claim to be an expert on anything so I would never mock someones knowledge. However for this member to ignorantly ignore the advice and reasoning of other members and continue to do themselves and the thread no justice is not particularly doing anyone any favours. Sometimes people need to listen and accept that they may not be right and other people may have more experience or knowledge on a subject.

For the sake of conservation I hope this thread continues and that antimarco can accept what we are saying, because we have a real opportunity here to provide a good practical plan for a hibernacula. These do work and I would urge anyone to consider making one if you have a spare part of the garden, you can even plant over the top of them.

[stigofthedump]

Originally Posted by Kayleigh

Does anyone on this site agree with what she is on about..

I certainly hope not. Indeed I wish she would just leave this thread be. I fear she is putting the whole thread in danger of closure. I have been learning from it and suspect a lot more like myself have too.

Vince

[Gill Catton]

A couple of possibly interesting points to add, firstly Deb your hibernacular are beautiful. All of the hibernacular on here are fab. Amphibians can and do move 500m in a year and sometimes even further especially the juvenilles. So almost any log pile/ rubble pile anywhere has some potential for them.

In addition once when i was helping to dismantle a small pond of the plasic rigid liner variety I found 3 newts and two toads all wedged in tightly together in a miniscule space between the liner and the soil(it was minute ha haa) so you'd also be amazed a the potentil number of newts you might find in even a small space, so the small hibernacular is still ace shame you can't fit a camera or fit a glass roof in these things to check!!

Also, I read an article somewhere about a hibernacular built for reptiles that could also be used as a bank to bask on in the summer, it had nice little plastic tubes leading in through the soild 'crust'. the lizards took to it immediately, however, they were not recorded using the tubes at all!! they must have found their own cracks and crevices ignoring man's carefully considered helping hand!!

I have built a largish one out of rubble from a building that was dismantled on site and i covered it in topsoil and turf from the same site so both reducing what went landfill and benefitting animals tha would use the hibernacular.

[Deb London]

I had assumed people would add comments and constructive criticism with respect to the designs for these and similar refugia and hibernacula. I was thinking in terms of dimensions, construction, materials, aspect, location etc. I was thinking in terms of the benefit of a species as a whole.

Questioning whether people should build these structures is a different topic altogether.

If I had strong objections to something(s) that I'd seen happening in the field of wildlife conservation, I'd raise them. But I wouldn't hijack someone else's thread to do so. Unless it was the first and only instance where that I'd seen that sort of thing happening. But this is not the case on this thread, now is it? Therefore I believe this is not a genuine and considered argument and as such, has absolutely no place on a site with as much expertise and educated and rational opinion as Wild About Britain. To be honest, threads like this could potentially damage WAB. Fact.

Back on topic. Mark, your design has given me inspiration. The way you use brash to cover the structure and then soil on that means that this design is suitable for our volunteer group, and I will be copying your post and emailing it to our group leader.

I won't be referencing this thread as I don't think that it is useful to the wider audience.

[Deb London]

Originally Posted by Gill Catton

A couple of possibly interesting points to add, firstly Deb your hibernacular are beautiful. All of the hibernacular on here are fab and I would like to add another voice to the general disagreement with animartco's views. Amphibians can and do move 500m in a year and sometimes even further especially the juvenilles. So almost any log pile/ rubble pile anywhere has some potential for them.

Still its true that the odd animal may be too deep underground to be detected when building ponds or hibernacular. However, if say ten bank voles, seven newts and a frog are accidentally squashed in the construction of such a feature but the feature allows an additional 50 to 100 animals to survive the winter or reach maturity this is still then a massively beneficial activity.

In addition once when i was helping to dismantle a small pond of the plasic rigid liner variety I found 3 newts and two toads all wedged in tightly together in a miniscule space (it was minute ha haa) so you'd also be amazed a the potentil number of newts you might find in even a small space, so the small hibernacular is still ace shame you can't fit a camera or fit a glass roof in these things to check!!

Also, I read an article somewhere about a hibernacular built for reptiles that could also be used as a bank to bask on in the summer, it had nice little plastic tubes leading in through the soild 'crust'. the lizards took to it immediately, however, they were not recorded using the tubes at all!! they must have found thier own cracks and crevices ignoring man's carefully considered helping hand!!

Very interesting and useful post Gill. I've found newts in weird places in the past, wedged into spaces and doing their own thing. Based on where I found them, I had a feeling they have a fondness for rubble before I asked for advice, so I do feel that my small garden refuge might work to some degree.

And we were joking about cameras and glass rooves just the other day.

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by Gill Catton

In addition once when i was helping to dismantle a small pond of the plasic rigid liner variety I found 3 newts and two toads all wedged in tightly together in a miniscule space between the liner and the soil(it was minute ha haa) so you'd also be amazed a the potentil number of newts you might find in even a small space, so the small hibernacular is still ace shame you can't fit a camera or fit a glass roof in these things to check!!

.

in a similar vein I remember lifting a pond liner (it was school nature pond that had had its liner peirced by vandals using bits of TV ariel IIRC) and finding about a dozen newts hibernating under the lip of the liner

we simply replaced the liner with a new one and refilled the pond - the newts werent disturbed and carried on hibernating in the same place.

Ive also found them inside hollow trees - when we've felled the tree , or cleared a storm thrown one - and again the logs would just be stacked up newts and all

On the point about the plastic tubes, I think they like to be in tight spaces , and iregular voids - hence why rubblle and or logs are ideal for building a hibernaculum

(we also once converted an old pillbox to a bat hibernaculum, and on subsequent roost visits found the the broken concrete flloor and walls had amphibians (both newts and frgs) hibernating in the cracks

[Fauna]

Originally Posted by animartco

lOOK at these dreadful pictures of bomb sites people. Haven't you got eyes? Can't you see the churned up tyre tracks in what was once a habitat for helpless little animals? Don't believe these so called wild life managers. They get payed for the work they do and that is the ONLY reason they do it.
And what is the end result? A little pile of nettles on a flat field. Only two plant species visible!
Reservess shoild be created and then LEFT ALONE, apart from a warden whose job it should be to ensure that THERE IS no disturbance.

So i guess under your logic of wildlife management and conservation methods we should be damned for making this...

We had to get machines into do the job. Yes it can look destructive to start with, but imagine how much more of a benefit this site now holds for wildlife.

[Deb London]

Very nice Fauna!

The following wood pile is not natural and involved a bit of disruption to create it, no doubt:




But look what was inside:



A Common Lizard!

Of course people's efforts are worth it when you see the results.

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by Fauna

So i guess under your logic of wildlife management and conservation methods we should be damned for making this...

We had to get machines into do the job. Yes it can look destructive to start with, but imagine how much more of a benefit this site now holds for wildlife.

looks good to me - is it a channel connecting water courses, a drain, or just a very linear pond ?

On the wider issue, every part of the uk countryside (with the possible exception of some caledonian forest) is a consequence of management by people - so the idea of maintaining it by simply leaving it alone is flawed on so many levels that its hardly worth discussing.

I'd also point out the irony of this post

Originally Posted by animartco

. In intelligently managed public gardens, ponds are set in rockeries with close planted small shrubs backed by larger shrubs, and a solid path allowing the public to enter the area to admire the pond.

Those formal gardens are hardly a naturally occuring phenonemon (and anyone who thinks formal gardens are permantly planted with no further disturbance, knows as little about amenity horticulture as she does about wildlife conservation) and building the hard surface path (and indeed the pond) will have involved the use of heavy machinery and the complete detruction of whatever habitat was there before the formal garden was planted (not to mention that even hard surface paths have to be maintained every few years whicch also involves machinery)

So the use of heavy machinery to create features such as hibernacula to benefit wildlife is bad, but the use of heavy machinery to create a formal garden with non native plants is good ... erm... yeah.. right