Hibernation- natures ultimate power nap🦔

We are well and truly in autumns grasp, with the temperatures beginning to plummet and winter letting us know it is on its way. This is the time of year wildlife prepare and fatten up for the upcoming colder months. Food - shelter - survival is on the top of all creatures Christmas lists. Many species have adapted a unique way of surviving this difficult time- Hibernation. Something I wish I could spend my winter doing!

What is hibernation?

When I think of hibernation, I imagine a little, spikey, hedgehog snuggled cosy and peacefully snoozing away until the warmth of spring awakens the little gem and he begins of his scurry journey once more. Whilst this is partly true, hibernation is much more complex.

Hibernation is basically a longggg, deepppp sleep. It can last up to months on end, dependant on the species. During this time the animals heart rate and breathing will slow and their metabolism and body temperature will significantly drop. This means that they wont burn as much energy and can use stored fats to survive.

This strategy means they can go for long periods without eating and survive the cold with out the need to migrate to warmer climates.

BUT- it is not all snoozes and dreams. They will occasionally wake up to go to the toilet, look for a snack or, if the temperatures drop too far (that they are in danger of freezing to death), their bodies will wake them up to warm up. How cool is that?!

What is torpor?

Torpor is the short-term drop in body temperature and metabolism. So hibernation is an extended period of torpor. This occurs in response to daylength, temperature and hormone changes.

So...what animals in the UK hibernate throughout winter?

Mammals

There are only 3 mammals in the UK that hibernate- Bats, Dormice and Hedgehogs. Bats will find a hibernation roost to spend the winter where their body systems will slow down to save energy, and their heart rate will drop to around 20 beats per minute. This is incredible considering their hearts beat around 1,000 beats per minute in flight!

Dormice make an unusual decision for hibernation... they come down from the safety of the trees and make a nest on the woodland floor. They stay in this vulnerable deep sleep for months on end. They are very very sweet and have even been known to snore!

Hedgehogs are the iconic British representation of hibernation. These national sweethearts make a cosy nest out of fallen leaves in a sheltered area as their hibernacula. Hedgehogs love a messy woodland floor and gardens, so instead of raking up your garden leaves, leave a few behind for our spikey friends.

Species such as Badgers and squirrels, which some people associate with hibernation, do not in fact hibernate. Badgers are just less active in winter and go through cycles of torpor. They can stay in their underground sett for days with out food when conditions are bad, but do not take on the big snooze. The same goes for squirrels. They keep food stores outside their drays to minimalise time spent outside in the cold and can rest in their cosy homes for days at a time if the weather is to harsh.

Reptiles

All British reptiles hibernate! Slow Worm, Adder, Grass Snake, Common Lizard, Sand Lizard, and Smooth Snake, all take the big winter snooze. This is because reptiles need sun to regulate their body temperature, so when winter comes, hibernation is needed to survive. Reptiles go into a version of hibernation called brumation. This specific term applies to reptiles and is associated with cold-blooded animals compared to hibernation which is more associated to warm-blooded animals. Brumation is the same as hibernation meaning the reptiles enter a state of deep sleep where they may not eat, drink, move or go toilet for several weeks on end.

Amphibians

All British species of amphibian hibernate too! BUT not all individuals will... depends on the temperature. Common Frog, Common Toad, Natterjack Toad, Pool Frog, Great Crested Newt, Smooth Newt, and Palmate Newt- all have the ability to sleep away winter. In chilly conditions when there is good, oxygenated water quality, frogs can stay submerged under water for several months! They will mainly choose to hibernate on land, but some will chose a pond. Frogs and toads tend to choose compost heaps, burying themselves in mud or leaf litter as hibernacula.

Insects

Quite possibly the most fascinating group that hibernate. Most insects will overwinter as eggs or larvae, but some rebels take on winter in adult form. Butterflies fall into this group with 5 of our 59 resident species of butterfly spending the winter as hibernating adults. These species include Brimstone, Peacock, Comma, Small Tortoiseshells and Red Admirals all taking on the big sleep. These butterflies like hollow trees, log piles and old rabbit holes but can also be seen hibernating in buildings. I have some beautiful Peacock butterflies hiding in the hay shed on the walls and hay bales! So beautiful. Many other insects hibernate also, such as some species of Ladybirds, bees and wasps!

Zzzzzz!

Charlotte Wells- Education Officer & Moth Mad!

Today we have the wonderful Charlotte Wells talking to us about her career as an Wildlife Education Officer and her LOVEEEEEE for all things moths!

Short bio about yourself and your career:

I’m Charlotte and I’m the Education & Community Officer for the Wildlife Trusts. I grew up on the Isle of Man surrounded by nature, but despite the amazing wildlife there weren’t many opportunities for a career in conservation, and even less in environmental education. This made it very difficult to even gain experience, so I found opportunities that made it possible for me to gain experience up and down the UK. I completed a Zoology degree and Conservation Masters down in Cornwall before heading up to Scotland to be a residential volunteer at the Scottish Whale and Dolphin Centre. I then spent a few weeks surveying grey seal pups and a long winter trying to identify them all from photos, before heading down to Devon to complete a funded ‘Marine Education Ranger’ Traineeship. After that I managed to secure my first proper paying job, a year-long contract in Oxford with the wildlife trust there as an Education Officer. When that was over I finally made my way to Essex after being offered my current job to work with the lovely team at Abberton.

How did your career begin?

I have known since I was a child I wanted to work with animals having been absolutely obsessed with tigers. My first taste of environmental education was delivering the animal encounter and feeding talks at the Wildlife Park back on the Isle of Man when I was in sixth form. I had always hated public speaking but wanted to gain some experience and really just to have an excuse to play with the bearded dragons, snakes and lesser hedgehog tenrec! After finally working up the courage to talk, I realised I actually loved telling people all about wildlife and turned out I was so enthusiastic about animals that I was good at it! My time at university gave me the knowledge I needed, and the chances I got to help with events like Bioblitzs and activities with the local primary school convinced me environmental education was definitely for me. Although it took a lot of volunteering and effort to turn it from a passion to a career!

What does your job entail?

I organise and deliver all the educational events for children and occasionally for adults to! This involves running curriculum linked school visits, or sometimes visiting the children at their schools to run workshops. I run our weekly Nature Tots group for children under 5 to get them outside and interested while they are young. I am in charge of the school holiday events programmes, where we run activities like pond dipping, bug hunting, dinosaur discovery, fairy trails and wild art just to name a few almost every day. And if that wasn’t enough, I host nature themed birthday parties most weekends as well. I don’t just do the fun bits though; I also handle the admin side including taking the bookings, risk assessments, advertising and invoices. So basically I get to spend my days running around a nature reserve looking for wildlife and playing nature based games with large groups of overexcited children, often in pouring rain – it’s fabulous!

Please highlight a conservation issue you are particularly involved in:

I think educating future generations is in itself a conservation issue and one I am clearly involved in. In particular getting children outside and engaging with nature and helping them to reduce their plastic use. Essex Wildlife Trust runs plasticology workshops where we teach children how to recycle and think about small changes that can be made to reduce our single plastic usage. An even bigger issue for me is how many children do not spend time outside - and unfortunately many schools don’t provide outdoor learning opportunities. It is so beneficial for children, including improving wellbeing, mental health, physical strength, co-ordination, social skills, risk management. My entire job is about encouraging children to spend more time in nature and get outdoors but recently I have been working on the Nature Friendly Schools Project. It is an enormous countrywide project that works with select schools to give them the knowledge and resources to make outdoor learning a regular feature of each week in an effort to improve the mental health and wellbeing of the pupils! It is an insane amount of work but undeniably rewarding.

What can people do you help with this issue?

Anyone can make small little swaps to reduce their plastic, including swapping clingfilm for foil, beeswax wraps or reusable boxes; a reusable water bottle, shampoo bars or even a bamboo toothbrush. And you can encourage children you know to go outside, point out bugs and trees, jump in puddles, make a mud pie and just ignite the spark of interest from which a love of nature can grow!

How did you get into moths?

My friend dragged me to a moth morning run by the ecological society (it was far too early for me) in our 3rd year at university - but I haven’t regretted getting out of bed for a moment. They had received funding that allowed them to buy several moth traps which were set out overnight at various sites around the local reservoirs, and so they ran regular events to go see what they caught. I could not believe that moths were so interesting! 2500 species in the UK alone, they are not all tiny, they definitely are not all brown, so fluffy and the names are fascinating (neglected rustic, feathered gothic, uncertain). I convinced my Dad to make me a moth trap for my birthday as I couldn’t afford to buy one and it has been all round the country with me. Not only do the moths come to you for minimal effort but I still see multiple new species every year and I imagine I always will – I cannot recommend giving it a go enough if you get the chance.

What is your greatest achievement?

I think my greatest achievement was organising the Fishstock Festival activities week for local school children when I was a Marine education trainee in Devon. It involved things I do every day now, but at the time I had never done most of them before and had very little help to arrange. I organised for a different school group to get a tour of the local fish market every day for a week. I then arranged coaches to take them back to the farm I worked at where I taught them all about sustainable fishing, gave them cooking lessons where we made fish tachos with salsa and booked a local artist to run workshops where they made a large fish and royal themed (weird combination I know) piece of artwork. I did all of it myself, from budgeting, risk assessing and finding an artist to booking the schools, coaches and ordering and preparing 15kg of sustainably caught fish! I probably got just as much experience from organising and running this one week of activities as I did the rest of my traineeship.

What is your favourite species and why?

So hard to pick! I love tigers, bumble bees, whales but I think it has to be a moth. The garden tiger is probably my favourite one I have caught. The colours are amazing, with white and brown patchy forewings and bright orange hindwings with black spots outlined in yellow and filled with blue! When I finally caught one in my garden it was so much bigger and more beautiful than I had anticipated. I love that this amazing creature is just flying around in our gardens and most people haven’t even heard of them let alone seen one. And if that wasn’t enough their caterpillars are so fluffy they are known as woolly bears.

Advice for people wanting to pursue a career in wildlife education?

Probably the same advice as most people give, but volunteer and get as much experience as you can; In particular working with children of different ages, even if it isn’t in an environmental setting. A good tip I was given is too look at the experience required on jobs that you aspire to – and try volunteering to do that. If you know who you would like to work for then try and volunteer with them, it is a really great way to get your foot in the door and may help your chances if a job comes up as you will know what they do and how they do it. Don’t give up if it doesn’t happen straight away, you will almost certainly have to work your way up from volunteer to seasonal to full time. It is quite a small sector and I personally found it really hard to get enough experience because of where I was from, so for me it was a long process but I didn’t give up and it paid off. And lastly make sure you have a good CV and ‘additional information’ section for application forms. You will need to adapt it for each job, but it is this that gets you the interview – fill it in wrong or write it badly and you will never get to show them how great you are in person no matter how much experience you have!

DR Kim Wallis- Conservation Advisor and Bat Woman!

Today we have the brilliant DR Kim Wallis to talk to us about her career as a conservation advisor and being batty for bats!

Short bio about yourself and your career:

I’ve always had an interest in animals and from a very early age my parents learnt I was happiest outside (apparently I was a bit of a pain otherwise!). I was lucky enough to grow up on a small farm so I think early exposure probably helped shape my career path. I started working as a Conservation Advisor for Essex & Suffolk Water in 2008 and with their support gained my PhD in 2017. My small

mammal exploits started shortly after my BSc and have continued in both my working and voluntary life. This primarily involves bats but also dormice with the former taking me overseas and seeing me spending a lot of time rehabilitating sick and injured bats. More recently I have got in ornithology and am registered as a trainee bird ringer which I am loving. Ringing and my involvement with Abberton Reservoir has also led to me becoming a Visiting Fellow with Essex University.

On a more personal level and away from work, I spend time with my horses, dog, friends and family (albeit in a slightly different and limited way at the moment). I’m partial to a good glass of wine or G&T!

How did your career begin?

Early on with interest and volunteering then completed degree in Ecology at Essex University. Following that I sent my CV to a few contacts and luckily one landed on the desk of Miranda who is now my boss!

One of the main reasons for my employment was to work on the Abberton Scheme which gave me valuable experience and has been fundamental to my career progression. Firstly because of the incredibly supportive and infinitely more experienced people I was lucky enough to work with and learn from, but also because I completed my doctorate using Abberton as a case study.

What does your job entail?

My job within the conservation and land management team is varied and aside from the usual budgetary, report writing and admin tasks, principally involves screening internal projects for ecological issues and enhancement opportunities; carrying out protected species surveys and subsequently providing advice which involves liaison with internal and external stakeholders; managing our land holdings for conservation and leading on the development of a scientific arm to the department.

Please highlight a conservation issue you are particularly involved in:

Bat conservation! I am one of Essex Bat Groups principle bat carers and rehabilitate sick and injured bats. Aside from the joy and reward of saving the lovely little critters, one very important role of bat care is influencing public perception of bats, which I’m sad to say, isn’t always good. When you show someone a bat in the hand though, be that one of the education bats I have (long term captives that are unable to be released), or a bat being released back to the wild (we take them back to where they were found), people get a different and positive experience. The interactions also provide a fantastic opportunity to explain the benefits of bats and dispel some of the myths surrounding them.

What can people do you help with this issue?

Learn and understand a bit more about bats, let the local records centre know of any roosts found and by keeping cats inside during peak activity times (around dawn and dusk). Sadly many of the bats carers see have been attacked by cats.

How did you get into bat care?

Many years ago I attended a bat walk with a friend and met a lady called Jan Ragg who cared for bats. I found it incredibly inspiring, started training with her and the rest is history! Jan sadly passed away a few years ago but I will always be grateful for all the advice she gave me.

Your greatest achievement:

Probably my PhD.

Your favourite species:

Ooh tough one! UK/EU wise, equally probably Leislers and the Brown Long Eared. Further afield (I spent three months studying bats in Mexico with Opwall last year), Centurio senex (wrinkle faced bat) or for cuteness, Artibeus phaeotis (pygmy fruit-eating bat).

Advice for people wanting to pursue conservation or ecology as a career?

Good choice and don’t give up! Get as much experience as you can which may involve volunteering and find what you are really passionate about.