Bird and bat boxes

Photographed by Geoff Bell in June 2013

For more than thirty years, bird boxes to aid nesting have been installed in Bourne Wood, mainly through the efforts of local naturalist and in conjunction with the Friends of Bourne Wood organisation. But there has been a continual problem of damage to the wooden structures by woodpeckers which led to a search for a more durable material.

A solution to the problem came in January 2011 when containers of a stronger material were installed, courtesy of the Len Pick Trust which made a grant to pay for 57 new nest boxes made of a more durable material, known as woodcrete, a mixture of cement, clay and sawdust which is virtually indestructible and should certainly withstand event the strongest beak. They are also warm in winter for roosting birds and cool in summer, allowing chicks to prosper with a 32 mm hole that enables access for a wide variety of species including great tits, blue tits, coal tits, marsh tits and nuthatches.

The new boxes were fitted to trees alongside the main paths at the southern end of the wood in time for the new breeding season which traditionally starts on February 21st when visitors could enjoy seeing an increase in the population of nesting birds which will have a greater level of protection from natural predators.

John Freear, chairman of the trust, said that they were delighted to support the conservation programme. "Bourne Wood is a fantastic asset right on our doorstep and gives tremendous enjoyment to many thousand of people each year", he said. "We hope that this project will assist the indigenous bird population to thrive and increase."

The Friends of Bourne Wood is an organisation of volunteers devoted to the preservation and enhancement of the wood and many major conservation projects are among their activities in recent years. In March 2007, members installed new bat boxes at various vantage points, the timber being donated by local businessman Ronnie Branch of Branch Bros. A small but efficient production team of Friends under the direction of forestry ranger Willie McLaughlin carried out the work assembling and positioning the new bat boxes.

Bourne Wood hosts about seven out of the 17 bat species found in the British Isles and of special interest is the rare Leisler bat, the only place in Lincolnshire where it can be found. Other bat residents include the pipistrelle, Daubenton's, the whiskered, the brown long-eared and the noctule bats. The new bat boxes were placed on selected trees, often three around a trunk, to enable bats move around to avoid full sun.


The bat box project launch in 2007 (left) with forestry ranger Willie McLaughlin (green jersey) and some of the Friends of Bourne Wood and the bird box scheme of 2011 (right) with Mick Curtis (on the ladder), Friends secretary Sarah Roberts and John Freear of the Len Pick Trust.

The bird boxes installed in January 2011 were monitored during a two-week period the following May by members of Friends of Bourne Wood who found that the results have surpassed all their hopes. Fifty-six of the boxes were used, thirty-six by blue tits and twenty by great tits and only one box, No 13, was empty.

A sample of the boxes was chosen and their occupants tagged with rings as part of a scheme run by the British Trust for Ornithology. Figures from the BTO indicate that blue tits have an average of just over seven chicks and great tits average six. This would mean that the woodland nest boxes would have produced around 400 babies in their first year.

They are fed on the oak tree caterpillars that are abundant at the time the chicks hatch and the dry, warm weather early in 2011 had been particularly kind to most small birds and there was an abundance of caterpillars to feed on. Not all the chicks were expected to survive to breed the following year because they fall prey to many woodland and garden predators, including cats, sparrowhawks and some members of the crow family. None of the boxes were attacked by woodpeckers as they have in the past because of the special material used in their construction.

Photograph courtesy Daniel Henderson

Local naturalist Bob Sheppard, who first had the idea for the project, said: "The investment by the trust for this conservation effort has been handsomely repaid and will continue to do so for many more years."

Andy Rowe, the trust chairman, said : “We are very pleased to have been able to assist in this project and it is really pleasing to see such a successful return on our investment in such a short time span”.


A blue tit chick peeps out, anxiously awaiting a meal from its mother at their temporary home, one of the nesting boxes in Bourne Wood. This is No 100 situated close to the Beech Avenue entrance where this new arrival was spotted in June 2013 cautiously surveying the big world outside while its parents continue bringing it food.

REVISED JUNE 2013