July 2025

This is a Bechstein bat. They are absolutely stunning. It is one of the UK’s rarest and most endangered bat species. We captured her during our July 18^th Bat Survey night, under the guidance of licensed bat handler Martyn Cooke.

During the evening we also captured Pipistrelle and Natterers Bats, but this Bechstein was by far the most exciting. She is a one year old female and was feisty, as seen in this video.

Here is a slow-motion video of her being released. Watch to the end. Those last few seconds when she takes flight are incredible. It absolutely takes your breath away watching them soar away, off into the trees.

Bechstein’s can only be found in the South England (Wiltshire, Dorset, Devon typically) and in West Sussex we are right at the edge of their known range. Bechstein’s were recently in the news because a half mile £100m tunnel was proposed as part of the HS2 project to protect them. Our bat was captured at 1202am, literally 2 minutes after most of the people attending the evening had left (but they did get to see the Natterers Bat and the Pipistrelle bats)

Here is the Natterers Bat, so named after the Austrian naturalist Johann Natterer. The Natterer is distinguished by  ‘its ‘S-shaped calcar, the strip of cartilage that runs along the side of the tail membrane, and the fine white hairs along the edge of the membrane’. Yet another reason for only doing bat surveys with a licensed bat handler!

A tiny Pipistrelle bat. Our smallest and most common bat. Still beautiful though.

Note we have future Bat Survey evenings on August 29^th and Sept 26^th – there are still some places available if you want to come along. No charge, just message me on piers.clark@aspectnaturereserve.com if interested. Suitable for all ages.

Martyn had put some static bat monitors in the woods prior to the survey and these identified another rare (Annex 2) species, the Barbastelle. My dream is we trap one of those during our two forthcoming survey nights.

During the evening we also observed lots of moths and this rather lovely glow-worm (glow worms are insect larvae that can make their hind-quarters glow through bioluminescence)

This is what a Glow Worm looks like when the lights are on!

In other news, the Environment Agency had been very helpful and have given us a definitive identification of our crayfish species. It isn’t a White Claw (our only UK native species), nor is it a Signal Crayfish (the aggressive, invasive US species that has decimated the White Claw populations since it was deliberately introduced - for commercial reasons - in the 1970s).

It isn’t even the Red Swamp Crayfish (or Louisiana Crawfish) as we thought a couple of months ago.

It is a White River Crayfish – a new invasive species.

The White River Crayfish has apparently only been spotted in one other location in the UK. I liked how it 'danced' with me as I tried to record it.

 The White River Crayfish: When spotted in Belgium in 2019 it was only the 4^th time it had been seen outside the USA. Looks like it has now made it to the UK.

I attended a 2 day Crayfish course in Wiltshire this month, getting ‘hands on’ with both Signal Crayfish and White Claw Crayfish (being very careful not to cross contaminate as the Signal crayfish carries a plague toxic to the White Claw).  Seeing some rivers truly infested with Signal crayfish was both absorbing and heart-breaking.

Not sure what the collective noun is for multiple signal crayfish but a ‘bucketload’ seems to fit here!

Here is a group of us on the Crayfish Training Course undertaking a Torch Survey of the White Claws. Somewhat curiously this little pocket of White Claws was in a stream in the back garden of a private house (the owners only realised they had a White Claws present a couple of years ago).

The White Claws are much smaller than Signals, and are much gentler and, quite simply,  just really rather lovely. They have three incredibly tiny spines just on the bottom edge of their carapace but they can really only be felt with your fingertip rather than seen.

After an 18 month planning permission process we were finally able this month to start construction of the pond and (in a completely separate project) the creation of an area of the wet/flooded woodland. Loads of work to do over the coming years to turn these currently rather ugly ‘construction sites’ into the desired habitats, but this is an important first step.

Stop Motion Video over a 2 week period as the 50m x 30m pond was created

We have used the soil from the pond to create large banks around the western edge, which will be seeded with wildflowers. A bird-hide has been constructed within the bank, carefully positioned to ensure a full view of all sections of the pond, which will ultimately have zones of reeds, pebble and cobble ‘beaches’, rocky areas, and sunken wood habitats.

We are under the flight path and the good folk at Gatwick Airport have been incredibly helpful providing guidance to ensure the pond design will not attract bird species that could cause a bird-strike.

Wet/flooded woodland is a particularly useful, unique and infrequently found habitat across Britain. Creating a decent sized area of wet woodland has been a dream of mine since Richard Black, Sussex Wildlife Trust, told me they were the favoured habitat of Woodcocks. We had a brief sighting of a Woodcock last December in Mount Wood, and my hope is that with the creation of this new, much larger area we can entice them to stay longer. 

Part of the reason for creating the wet woodland is to hold water on site for longer periods.

Whilst sometimes the stream is full and requires a scaling with a great bound…

…for much of this past 2 months it has been bone dry due to the drought.

We did of course have some lovely rain last weekend and the stream levels were quickly rejuvenated

During July we had two separate days when local businesses visited to undertake a combination of team building exercises and games, and ecological activities.

These Team Activities included building the previously mentioned bird hide around the new pond….

… and constructing the 12m x 6m marque (our ‘covered’ classroom for when local schools visit).

If you are interested in organising a corporate visit to Aspect Nature Reserve let me know. We can provide an exciting day of team building activities (and games) with an important ecology and conservation angle. Here are a couple of quotes from our visitors this month:

'It's so rewarding to do hands-on conservation work with colleagues, getting your hands dirty together and making a real difference to this special part of the countryside. Fresh air, meaningful work and shared achievement is a great recipe' - Tom J

"We had a great day at Aspect Nature Preserve! I loved learning about and getting the chance to be part of such an exciting project, plus it was great to get some dirt under our nails and bond as a team. Getting outside of the office and working on something completely new with colleagues was such a great way to forget for a moment about our day-to-day, enjoy the change of scenery, give back to our environment and community, and tune into each other on a new level." - Lara A

"It was a perfect opportunity to connect outside the office and enjoy some quality time in nature." - Beatriz A

In the woodland pond our Mandarin chicks have grown well. Here they are at the start of the month…

...and her at the end of the month, almost adults!

This is despite the various predators, such as this Buzzard….

…and the Sparrow Hawk

Finally, I found this dead mole while on holiday. It was just lying on a path with no indication of what had caused its demise. If you have any suggestions on how I could capture images of live moles I am all ears…

See you next month, Please like and share as appropriate.