This page is for news and information about Hertfordshire's Mammals
If you are interested in Bats contact the Herts & Mddx Bat Group www.hmbg.org.uk
 Malanistic Fallow Buck seen near Wheathampstead
Robin Pearson saw and photographed this dark Fallow Deer buck near the Black Bridge landfill site on 7 November. It was seen again with a large group of females and immatures on 16th, see below.
Our county mammal recorder Jenny Jones, said:
'This is a Fallow buck, but at first sight the dark colour indicated it might have been a Sika deer which would have been very interesting. Earlier this year a Sika Deer was recorded near Bricket Wood Common, but they are rare in Hertfordshire'.
 Changing vegetation means deer become more visible in autumn. We have had a number of sightings of groups of Fallow Deer from all over the county. There is a lovely photo in the Mammals Photo Gallery taken by Keith Smith of a group of Fallow Deer in Lower Lilley Bottom.
A white female Fallow Deer has also been seen in a group near Peters Green.
Please submit your mammals records using our new on-line system.
All records will be added to the HNHS database and some of the more interesting records will feature on the Species Group page.
Polecats or polecat-ferrets?
Polecat raod casualties are a regular occurrence particularly in the central part of the county. For more details see the sightings archive. In the first week of August 2010 we had two records of Polecats found dead by the roadside. One was found by Andrew Palmer at Prae Wood, near St Albans, the other by Ian Flack at Archers Green, Tewin. But are they Polecats or Polecat-ferret hybrids? Have a look at the photographs below and let us know what you think; email .
Michael Clark's comments are below.
Polecats were common in Hertfordshire 200 years ago but were exterminated by gamekeepers and absent from the county for most of the last century.
Michael Clark describes, in his book on Mammals of Hertfordshire, that he released captive bred polecats in Hertfordshire in the 1980's and 90's. Eight were released at Tewin, five at Bramfield, five in Broxbourne woods and three at Essenden in 1981-2 and in 1992-4 a further seven at Watton-at-Stone, five at Ashridge and two in the Broxbourne Woods complex.
In The Hertfordshire Naturalist 2009, Jenny Jones reports records of Polecats from Hitchin, Reed, Stanstead Abbots, Welwyn, Ayot St Lawrence and Hertford. (Trans HNHS, Vol 41, Part2, page167).
 
Prae Wood, 1 August 2010.
 
Archers Green, Tewin,
3 August 2010.
Michael Clark has looked at the photos and thinks they are both Polecats. The one found at Prae Wood is an adult male and the other a young one, probably a female. Young ones are always darker and the colouring is typical of this time of year. He says ferrets will interbreed with Polecats and there are pale versions you see where polecat-ferret crosses are surviving in the wild. They eventually colour to the wild form and if dead, the skull can confirm things – see photos in Michaels book Mammals of Hertfordshire.
Ferrets will always be escaping and there will always be mixing, but the Welsh strongholds have the same looking Polecats which are darker in summer coat and paler in winter.
Lemsford Springs on The One Show
A specially commissioned small mammal survey at Lemsford Springs Nature Reserve was featured on BBC1's prime time television programme The One Show.
Presenter Mike Dilger has always wanted to see a Water Shrew so the BBC combined with local naturalists and HNHS members, Peter Oakenfall and Barry Trevis to organise a week long survey. Peter set a number of Longworth traps and six species of small mammal were found:
 Water Shrew
Pigmy Shrew
Common Shrew
Short-tailed Field Vole
Bank Vole
and Wood Mouse
The feature was broadcast on Thursday 25 March.
The Water Shrew is the largest of our three shrew species and and the rarest. It has black fur with a white underside.
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