SBG Winter programme – 31Oct23

Posted on by somersetbatgroup in Bat News, SBG Events, SBG News, SBG Newsletter

In this bat group newsletter, we have:

  • A series of batty talks on Zoom over the winter.
  • Details of our group visit to Heal Rewilding.
  • Can you help with … requests for batty things?
  • A message about the end of the Bats in Churches project and …
  • … an offer of free Peersonic recording devices for bat group projects engaging with churches.
  • The latest BCT Bat Group Bulletin which includes news that the Bat Earned Recognition Project moves from trial to ‘Business As Usual’.

Winter Zoom talks 23/4

Our friends in the Avon Bat group have organised a series of winter Zoom online talks. In the spirit of collaboration, they have extended the invitation to these events to Somerset (and Wilts) Bat group members. They promise to be very interesting so please do attend if you can.

Thurs 23rd Nov23 7:30PM- Madeline Davis, BCT – “AI in the forest”

Madeline will be talking about automatic sound classification software to monitor UK bats. It should be an excellent presentation and there will be an opportunity for Q & A afterwards.

“Madeline got interested in bats as a teenager walking around churchyards with a detector listening out for pipistrelles. She then went off to university and worked on chalk grassland ecology and started to get interested in the biodiversity and climate crises. After doing her biodiversity and conservation Masters she worked on climate change policy and then went on to study political debates around land ownership and access. She has worked in various mental health charities as a frontline advocate, trainer, and data analyst, and has a strong interest in social justice (particularly data justice!).

Madeline joined BCT in 2023 as the Science Projects Assistant to help out with the passive acoustic monitoring on the Bats and Forest Projects, handling equipment and the acoustic data from processing to classification.”

Thurs 18th Jan 2024 7.30PM – Thomas Foxley, UWE – Greater Horseshoes

Tom is a Post Graduate Researcher in the Ecology & Conservation Research Lab at UWE. Those who caught Toms presentation to SBG in March this year will recall the fascinating early insights he was gaining into the Greater Horseshoe populations in North Somerset. He was presenting very early results to us last spring so expect a full update now, with another years GPS and radio tracking data and modelling results.

  • Time: 18th Jan 2024 7.30 PM London
  • Zoom Meeting details to follow latter

Thurs 22nd Feb 2024 7.30PM – Emma Stone, Bath Uni

Emma needs no introduction to SBG members. She is now the Senior Lecturer, Assistant Professor in the Milner Centre for Evolution at the University of Bath where she leads the Bat Conservation Research Lab. She will be updating us on her latest research.

  • Time: 22nd Feb 2024 7.30PM London
  • Zoom Meeting details to follow latter

Sat 23rd Mar 2024 – SBG visit to Heal rewilding.

Thank you to everyone who replied to our last newsletter regarding a visit to Heal Rewilding, Witham Friary, near Bruton. As so many responded we have organised the visit, and as Heal was busy most weekends for the next couple of months, it has now been planned for next spring.

There will be an initial presentation and talk in the farmhouse, before a short walk around part of the site, including teas, coffees, and biscuits of course.

Please park in the visitor parking as there won’t be enough space by the farmhouse. Find out more about Heal on their website: https://www.healsomerset.org.uk/

We have opened this event up to members of the Wilts (and Avon) Bat groups as well.

Can you help with …?

The bat group receives far more requests for help, than the committee can do. Hence please do let us know if you think you could help out with recent requests: somersetbatgroup@gmail.com

  • A UWE year 2 filmmaking student is currently preparing to make a short documentary. The team is interested in wildlife and local environments, and want to get in contact with any volunteers or people that would be interested in talking to them about bat conservation.
  • A primary school in Taunton would like a bat talk to a class after half term.
  • Bicknoller Women’s Institute (on the A358 between Taunton and Williton) would like a talk in 2024 about Bats. Second Thursday of each month at 7.30PM.
  • A lady in Keenthorne near Nether Stowey would like help identifying bats she sees locally.

Farewell from the Bats in Churches project

The group received the following message from the BiC project:

On 31 October 2023 the delivery phase of the Bats in Churches project will be complete. 

Five years ago, thanks to a grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund and the hard work and support of all our partners the Bat Conservation Trust, the Church of England, Natural England, Historic England and The Churches Conservation Trust, the project set out to help 100 ancient churches around England with their resident bats.

We also set out to survey more than 500 churches for bats, through our ambitious citizen science projects the National Bats in Churches Survey and Church Bat Detectives.

As the project draws to a close, we are celebrating achieving both of these goals. To date we’ve worked with more than 125 churches around England, helping with their bat populations through mitigation, funding, surveys, information and advice, help with cleaning and much more.

Our passionate and committed army of volunteers surveyed more than 750 churches through the National Bats in Churches Survey and Church Bat Detectives, and we’ll be publishing the results and findings of the survey in a peer-reviewed journal. The data will form a valuable resource to help church communities with bats going forwards.

We’ve also run a host of events online and in person, at churches around the country. Our end of project event Flying to the Future was held on 14 September at the church of St Mary Magdalene in Paddington, London, attended by more than 70 stakeholders. A summary of this is attached.

Additionally we’ve run school workshops, published an illustrated children’s book, launched a Bats in Churches Challenge Badge for young people and uniformed groups, and commissioned an interactive multimedia art installation that has toured nine churches and been visited by more than 5,000 people.

Our website Home – Bats In Churches will remain post project and is packed full of information, advice and resources. Our final project report will be published here later this year.

For those of you who have run bat walks and stalls at church fetes, helped out with schools, provided advice to churches, carried out surveys and monitoring, put up bat boxes, supervised mitigation works, written articles, taken part in training, helped with cleaning churches, been involved with our citizen science projects ….and more … we can’t thank you enough. Without you the project could not have achieved what it has.

Please continue to support churches wherever you can – and direct them to the Bat Advice Service if necessary.

Many thanks and best wishes,

Rose Riddell, Engagement Officer, Bats in Churches Project

Free Peersonic recording devices for bat group use

We received the following message from BCT. If you can think of a bat group use of Peersonic recording devices, especially if to do with churches, then please let us know, and we will apply on behalf of the group – somersetbatgroup@gmail.com

We are wrapping up the Bats in Churches project, of which BCT is a partner, and we have some equipment we can pass on to bat groups.

We can offer Peersonic bat detecting / recording devices with tripods to interested bat groups. For more information on what you can do with a Peersonic please see their website https://peersonic.co.uk/. Along with the device, we’ll provide information on the extended use of Peersonic recorders written by Peter Flory. The aim for sharing this equipment with bat groups is to increase bat group resourcing, with a focus on future engagement with churches. 

Please contact BCT with details of your bat group, the number of devices you’d ideally like (up to 5 per bat group), a sentence as to how these will be used to support work with churches.

Abby Packham, Bat Groups Officer

Bat group bulletin

The latest BCT Bat Group Bulletin includes news that the Bat Earned Recognition Project moves from trial to ‘Business As Usual’.

All past editions of the Bulletin can be found on this page of our website: