Last night Geraldine and Co braved the rain again at Stockgrove Geraldine wrote:
“Last night’s bat survey at Stockgrove was amazing. We are restricted to how many people are allowed to be there still, which was the only downside, oh it did rain a bit, so waterproofs were necessary again. This is definitely up there in my top 5 of surveys at Stockgrove.
There were bats in the multi hole tree roost, probably Pipistrelles, in the years that we’ve taken part in that survey it’s been Noctules in residence there or been vacant.
There were bats in one of the boxes nearish the lake, but as there were so few of us, no one stayed behind to count them out and id the species, again possibly one of the Pip species.
As we got near to the site of the old boathouse, I stayed at the bottom of the hill, while two Bat Group members went up that steep hill to check on boxes. Mr H had gone along the path to check another box.
I had Soprano Pipistrelle flying around me, with a number of feeding buzzes. This individual was flying around below the tree canopy, we guess as that’s where the insects were likely to be present. Normally they would be hunting their prey higher up
When the other bat group members rejoined me, socially distanced of course, we stayed there for a while, enjoying watching this bat. I think it’s the closest views I’ve had of a Soprano Pipistrelle flying in the wild.
I ranked this as my 2nd most magical experience at this site. Number 1 spot still being held by a Brown Long Eared bat face to face encounter some years ago. Sometimes if you are lucky as BLE’s emerge from their roost, they will fly around and check you out before flying off to hunt for their meal.
Photo of Glow worm by Robin Scagell . Pinched from http://www.glowworms.org.uk/
As we continued our walk round the lake the other female bat group member spotted a glow worm.