Bats and Trees – Why it Matters

Arboricultural staff at WWA have recently completed a Bat Awareness and Bat Scoping Training Day with Anglian Ecology. The one-day course involved both classroom study and on-site practical survey work and provided knowledge on bat species and habitats as well as bat foraging and commuting. Successful completion of this course enables them to undertake initial scoping surveys on all sites, and also secondary non-specialist surveys on non-development sites, as proposed by British Standard 8596:2015 Surveying for bats in trees and woodlands guide.

You may be wondering why is this important?

All UK bats and their roosts are protected by law. If you are an owner or manager of trees you must meet the requirements to follow best practice to avoid killing, injuring or disturbing bats or destroying their roosts. It is a criminal offence to destroy a bat roost even if bats aren’t in it at the time. If you do, you are liable to an unlimited fine and, possibly, a prison sentence.

This qualification allows arboricultural staff at WWA to carry out baseline scoping and secondary surveying to establish whether there is potential for bat roosts in trees. The survey involves identifying potential roosting features such as cracks, lifted bark and cavities. Trees can be identified as low or medium/high risk of bat roost presence. Trees with low risk can be ruled out with no need for further survey, whilst trees with medium/high risk can be identified and recommendations made for more detailed and specialist surveys.

Click here for more about our arboricultural services, either in conjunction with landscape architecture services or stand-alone.

The photo of the tree which is a known bat roost is provided courtesy of Sue Morgan of Anglian Ecology.