Small mammal trapping

 

Longworth Small Mammal Traps. We put voles’ favourite food in the trap and grass to keep them warm. The door will shut (like the right one) once a vole gets in.

 

What?  Small Mammal trapping in Sutton Park National Nature Reserve.   A chance to find out what mice and voles can be found in the woodlands of Sutton Park and a chance to visit Britain’s only urban National Nature Reserve.   We used Longworth Small Mammal Traps to survey one of the woodlands in the park.  To increase the chances of success, we traped over three days. We also set tracking tunnels, which survey mammals by recording their tracks using ink pads and paper.

We caught wood mice, field voles and bank voles…. and deer and fox said Hello to our spy camera.

 

 

A rabbit spotted by our spy camera

 

 

Caught a vole…

 

When?

Friday 26^th January  15:30 – 17:00  Set traps

Saturday 27^th January 9:00 – 10:00  check traps

Saturday 27^th January 16:00 – 17:00  check traps

Sunday 28^th January 9:00 – 10:30 – collect traps

Where? Meet outside Park House (Toby Carvery) B74 2YT.  Enter by Town Gate, a ten-minute walk from Sutton Coldfield Railway Station

Why? Small mammals are amongst our most abundant wildlife, but there are rarely seen because they are small, secretive and (in the case of mice), nocturnal.  The Longworth Small Mammal trap was designed to catch mice and voles without harming them, (indeed, some mice seem to enjoy the experience).   As well as adding to our knowledge of these under-recorded, this will be a good opportunity to see these charming little animals at close quarters.