It’s exciting to be restoring and creating habitats on land that was intensively managed mono-species pastureland.
Some of these habitats are natural ones such as woodland, hedgerow, ponds and meadow, while others are built habitats such as nest and roost boxes.
These actions have reaped phenomenal awards in terms of the variety and abundance of wildlife returning. We are so grateful to Gorilla Design for supporting our efforts with financial assistance for various projects which you can read more about below.
Bat Box on exterior of Barn to provide enrtance to Maternity Roost on interior of barn
Maternity Roost Box built by Brian and painted by our summer volunteer Shane
Female bats roost communally when ready to give birth to and raise their one pup each year and require very specific conditions within this environment.
Thanks to Gorilla Design’s support, we purchased all the materials for a Bat Maternity box, built and installed it on the inside gable end of the barn with an access tunnel to the outside. We have a camera installed and are hoping that bats will discover this cosy environment next spring!
Speaking of cameras, since the establishment of so many ponds at Wildacres we have had many more sightings of otter on the trail camera and in person! We will be creating an Otter Holt in early 2026 which will have a permanent monitoring camera within. Otters use dens, called ‘holts’, for shelter, resting, and giving birth to their two to three pups. They line their lair with grass and leaves for comfort. They use natural burrows and human structures that are well-hidden, warm and close to water.
Otter foraging for food in the large pond
Otter on the river
Otter at edge of large wildlife pond
Back to bats…because we are batty about them! The Bat Echolocation monitoring equipment we have been using for the past 5 years was kindly donated to us by our friends Joe and Ann Raynor who had been monitoring bats in Waterford for the previous 5 years and prior to this in the UK for several years.
This equipment has stood the test of time but now requires updating and we are grateful for the support from Gorilla Design to purchase this new equipment. We are very pleased to have been recording 8 of Ireland’s 9 bat species at Wildacres every year since 2020 under the BTO Acoustic Pipeline Project.
Daubentons Bat Myotis daubentons hunting over water.
Recorded regularly at Wildacres over the many wildlife ponds.
While we have captured beautiful badger activity on our trail camera over the past few years, this year we excitedly discovered a badger latrine!!
Every day throughout the summer we observed fresh deposits in the badger loo beside our riverwalk pathway. Many visitors got to enjoy seeing this interesting natural feature. It’s always amusing to have a crowd admiring a badger toilet! We have plans to build an artificial badger sett in the coming months.
Beautiful Badgers regularly use Wildacres as a rich hunting ground evidenced by the many trails and latrines seen.
One of our favourite ponds of the 67 we have created, was kindly sponsored by our friends at Gorilla Design.
We call it the Tanin pond – so named because of the very dark colour to the soil in this wetland area of the nature reserve. It is a permanent pond full to the brim all year round and the first pond in which we found smooth newts at Wildacres.
The ‘Tanin Pond’ is home to a vast array of aquatic plants and animals.
Native Hedgerow is often referred to as linear woodland. It is such an important habitat in a country that has less than 2% native woodland.
Gorilla Design financed the creation of a 100 metre stretch of species rich hedgerow at Wildacres which brings us to almost 3km of newly established wildlife corridor.
As if all of this wasn’t enough, Ashe Conrad-Jones, co-founder of Gorilla Design, is also one of our regular volunteers and we are so grateful for her friendship and support and never-ending enthusiasm for all things Wildacres!
Hawthorn in bloom at Wildacres – stunning native hedgerow plant.
Guelder rose fruiting with rich red berries. Another native hedgerow plant.
Thank you, Ashe and all the team, at Gorilla Design.
Based in Dublin and catering to events throughout Ireland, they specialise in Event Draping, Lighting, Staging and Set Design.
As well as supporting Wildacres, they also support Kildare Wildlife Rescue – so you can see there is a wild theme!
