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Lots more water vole action in "RETURN TO THE RIVER - Diary of a Wildlife Cameraman" a feature length nature documentary [ Ссылка ] (Trailer).
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'The Water Vole - A Quick Guide' was produced entirely by volunteers. The organisations referred to in the video and in the text above had no involvement in the making of the video.
Transcript of the video:
“Britain's fastest declining wild mammal”
- The Wildlife Trusts
“One of the most rapid and serious declines of any British wild mammal ever.”
- People's Trust for Endangered Species
(Transcript of the video narration)
Adult water voles are about the same size as a rat, only a little smaller.
They have a chubby, round-faced appearance and their fur is slightly chestnutty brown, although there are some water voles in Scotland which are black.
The ears are small... and fur-covered… and difficult to make out.
Fur also covers their feet and tail but these are often wet, giving the impression that the skin is dark.
They are strong swimmers and float higher in the water than a rat.
Water voles are important engineers in the landscape and other species benefit from their activities.
They need places where there aren't too many trees – where there's plenty of light ….and wide margins of lush overgrown vegetation.
Small channels and ditches, especially where there isn't a fast current, are a favourite, as long as the banks are left to grow.
Before this stream was tidied up by mowing it had a colony of water voles living along it.
Extensive grazing right up to the water's edge also prevents them from colonising.
They don't just live along rivers and streams though – they can be found on canals, lakes, ponds and in reedbeds too.
They have lots of predators and are constantly alert for danger so they're difficult to sneak up on - it can be hard to get a good view.
But because they're mainly vegetarian they have to eat a lot - about 80 percent of their body weight in food each day... so you can usually tell they're around just by all the nibbled off storks left behind.
Little piles of plant stems with the ends cut off at 45 degrees are an unmistakable trademark. And they take food into their burrows to eat.
Burrows are along the waters edge and in the bank above – and wider than they are high – up to a size you could roll a tennis ball into.
Some of the burrows will have distinctive grazed lawns around them.
Another tell-tale sign to look for are big piles of droppings. Droppings are cylindrical (like a cigar), blunt at both ends and don't smell. The colour varies between green, brown or black.
Water voles have many natural predators that they've evolved to live with but not the introduced mink. A breeding female can wipe out an entire water vole colony and in combination with habitat loss, it's thought that mink are the biggest factor driving water vole numbers to an all time low.
[Brown rat]
Water voles are easily confused with the much more common brown rat.
Rats have a more pointed head, hairless, sticking out ears and pale hands and feet, also without fur on them.
They have a very different diet – and seldom bother with eating vegetation. They like food that's high in starch and protein... and they'll jump and climb like a monkey to get at it.
The tail is scaley, thicker and longer than a water vole's, almost as long as the rest of their body.
Rat droppings are larger, foul-smelling, pointed at one end and are not left in piles like the water vole's.
