Picture by Ian Britton via FreeFoto
Whilst we are held to ransom by a serious cold snap, wildlife may also be struggling to cope with the snow and ice, warns the Wildlife Trust for Lancashire, Manchester and North Merseyside, and the organisation is urging us all to take some steps to help out.
Our wildlife is amazingly hardy and adaptable and can put up with a pounding from the weather. But prolonged periods of cold, continuing for weeks or months at a time, or severe and sudden changes in the weather, can cause it major problems.
Grazing animals, whether domestic sheep or wild hares, may not be able to get to the plants to feed because of snow and ice. And the frozen ground prevents rabbits and hares from nibbling grass, making these plant-lovers stay at home, so predators like stoats and owls find it harder to spot and catch them.
There is also less food around in hedgerows and woodlands for foragers – leaves have gone, plants withered or covered with snow, hedges stripped of berries, and insects dead from the cold or stuck in frozen soil or ponds.
Not many of our mammals actually hibernate for long periods during winter, they simply prefer to sleep when it gets cold, occasionally emerging to see what food might be available. But when severe weather hits, it’s much harder for mammals like badgers, hares, stoats and foxes to graze, forage or hunt for food: already we’re seeing foxes being more bold and more active in broad daylight. It can cause problems for some insects too.
Those which are active in the winter, such as winter-gnats and minotaur beetles, can cope with periods of cold weather, but deep snow may prevent them feeding for weeks at a time.
Perhaps surprisingly, insects and other animals which hibernate usually do better in cold winters: they use less energy while hibernating, and are less likely to be disturbed and come out to look for food which isn’t there. So, butterflies like the brimstone, peacock and comma, which hibernate as adults, and indeed, the other resident butterflies which spend the winter as eggs, caterpillars or crysalids, could benefit from this cold winter.
Likewise the mammals which do go into real hibernation, the dormouse and the bats, may appreciate the cold. Perhaps the most difficult circumstance for most wildlife is bouts of severe cold and snow, interspersed with warmer-than-normal conditions, which wake them up, only for the next cold spell to drive them back (or, in the case of plants, harsh frost might even damage the premature tender shoots).
If you’d like to help our wildlife cope this winter and in future winters, try the following steps:
• Put out nuts, seeds, fat and water for garden birds.
• Grow patches of tall grass in your garden to shelter butterflies.
• Don’t cut back your herbabeous plants till the spring, so their hollow stems can provide snug hibernation sites for ladybirds and other beneficial insects.
• Provide insect homes for over-wintering lacewings and other invertebrates.
• Buy or make a hedgehog home for hibernating hogs.
• Grow climbers like ivy to provide shelter for birds and insects.
• For more information visit: www.lancswt.org.uk