The Great Nut Hunt: Brits are Urged to Go Nuts to Save The Dormouse

Above is a picture of a dormouse – cute little chap ain’t he?  Unfortunately his cousin, the hazel dormouse, is thought to be on the decline and UK charity The People’s Trust for Endangered Species are urging woodland walkers to look out for signs so that a survey can be conducted to discover just how many we still have living here in the UK and where they seem to have settled.

The hazel dormouse, as its name suggests, loves nothing more than nibbling on a hazel nut but, unlike squirrels, the dormouse doesn’t tend to demolish the whole kit and kaboodle – he prefers to bite a small hole in the side and suck the innards out of the nut.  The hole looks very much as if it’s been drilled so it’s quite distinctive.  The Trust are then asking people to send the nut with a note of when and where they found it to enable them to compile a detailed report of where precisely these little critters hang out.  The Trust have added a bit of incentive to the Great Nut Hunt by hiding 20 silver hazelnuts and one gold plated one at various places throughout England and Wales.

Survey packs are available from the Trust – go to http://www.ptes.org/ for more details.

More Hazel Dormouse Details

I think the majority of us, when we were kids, loved to hear Lewis Carroll’s story of Alice in Wonderland and the one part of the story that always sticks out in my mind is the Mad Hatter’s tea party where the dormouse seems perpetually to be asleep.  And this, my friends, is exactly what the dormouse likes to do with his life – sleep.  He spends his days curled up in hedgerows or in tree tops using hollow tree trunks and abandoned birds’ nests as a B&B and then comes out for a feed at night but he rarely comes down to ground level, preferring to do his foraging in tree tops and thick hedgerows. 

This tiny little creature has a body length of about 2″ and has a tail of around the same length.  He can weigh anything from 17g (less than an ounce) to around 40g (almost 2 oz) by the time he’s ready to hibernate in winter.  He hibernates once the weather turns frosty (normally October/November) and doesn’t come out of his hidey-hole until around the following April.  During this time, in order to conserve his energy, he curls up in a tight ball, his body temperature drops to about that of his surroundings and his heart beat and breathing rate reduce by about 90%.  So if you do find a dormouse from October through to April please don’t give him a poke to check he’s alive; he’s probably just sleeping.

As nuts are generally only available to him during the autumn months, he actually has quite a varied diet.  He enjoys pollen, flowers, fruit and insects and he’s particularly drawn to brambles, oak and even honeysuckle!

Hazel dormice are found mainly in southern UK but have been sighted as far north as Hereford.  So, if you live in the UK get out there into some ancient woodland and seek out those nibbled nuts – and if you can’t find any dormouse nibbled ones, you can still gather a few for the family to nibble on!

I’m pleased to say that, here in Norfolk, my partner and I planted up a hazel tree at the bottom of our garden a couple of years ago.  It only cost us about £10 for a 4′ tree including postage (from Buckingham Nurseries online) and in the first year we had several hazel nuts but unfortunately the grey squirrels whipped ‘em away before we had a chance to pick them, but this year we had a good supply and were able to leave some on the tree for the local wildlife.  So give it a go Joe!  Either seek out some hazel nuts that look as if the dormice have been at them and send them to the Trust or, if you’re not able to do that, invest in a hazel tree.  Do your bit for the local dormouse community!!  He may be small but he’s definitely worth saving.