Upstream battle for the water vole

The water vole population has fallen by 90 per cent in the past century – the most severe decline of any wild mammal in the UK.

The People’s Trust for Endangered Species hopes that communities will register sightings of the animals as encouraging signs of recovery emerge. The trust’s National Water Vole Monitoring Programme began last year, with 188 sites surveyed and data submitted online.

Almost 150 sites were surveyed previously by the Vincent Wildlife Trust and 44 new ones were signed up to the programme by volunteers. Sixty-eight showed evidence of water voles being present.

Once a common sight on riverbanks and waterways, the decline of water voles has resulted from a combination of the intensification of agriculture and the prevalence of non-native US mink in the Eighties and Nineties.