A Wonderful Weekend in Wales

S1E5 Episode five was recorded in May at the Wales Bat Worker’s weekend. The weekend brings together bat workers from across Wales and further afield and Steve speaks to four of them in this episode.

Naomi Webster the is the Training & Conferences manager at BCT and gives an insight into what happens at a BCT event.

Steve Lucas is the Wales Bat Officer and Species Legislation & Policy Specialist. He talks about bat work in Wales and what Brexit might mean for bat conservation.

Denise Foster has recently moved to Wales and is now heading up the Wales element of the National Nathusius Pipistrelle Project (see episode 4 for more on that!).

Jean Matthews sits on BCT’s Board of Trustees and talks to Steve about her work with bats over the years and what sort of things Gwynedd Bat Group gets up to.

To find out more about the Wales Bat Worker’s Weekend, visit https://www.bats.org.uk/our-work/conferences-symposia/welsh-bat-conferences/wales-bat-workers-weekend 

For more details about the events that the Bat Conservation Trust is putting on this year, just head to https://www.bats.org.uk/events

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Producer: Steve Roe @SteveRoeBatMan
Cover Art: Rachel Hudson http://rachelhudsonillustration.com/info

Transcript

Steve Roe: 0:05

This week we're dropping in on the 2019, Wales bat workers weekend which took place in May. And I spoke to four people over the course of the weekend. Training and conferences manager Naomi Webster gave us an insight into what happens at a Bat Conservation Trust event. Naomi, we're here at the Wales back workers weekend. What sort of effort goes into organising one of these weekends?

Naomi Webster: 0:27

I like to think that the impression I give is the swan that we glide smoothly along as far as all the delegates are concerned underneath, the team and I are often paddling rather frantically. I'm very fortunate that I do get to say the team. Because while I'm the only official conferences, person, everyone at BCT, will pull together and help me actually put this together. So here in Wales, it has been great because Steve [Lucas] is our Wales bat officer has taken the lead on the programme. So he's pulled together all of the great talks, and the workshops and everything that everyone's been doing. We've had a lot of support from Sam Dyer from Natural Resources Wales to help with the amazing fieldwork that's going on. And so the murmur in the background is everyone now analysing their data, all the calls and things that they got from the fieldwork that they did last night, which is always great fun. And that's one of my favourite bits actually, is seeing all the people come together, they've all got this shared passion for bats and actually seeing them they may not have worked together before. But all this networking, sharing skills supporting one another, and of course, supporting the bats.

Steve Roe: 1:29

How many people have we got here this weekend?

Naomi Webster: 1:31

So this weekend, we've got 72/73 here, which is, which is a really nice number, cuz I think it's meant that people can get together, it is one of our smaller events. And because it's a weekend event, it's can often be harder for people to get away for a whole weekend. It's been lovely being up here in Wrexham. Actually, we've been quite lucky with the weather, although it was a bit cold for the field work last night. But we've had some lovely sunshine outside, although we've been dragging people into a dark lecture theatres to educate them. But no, it's been a lovely atmosphere really, really friendly. That's one of the things every event is I love how friendly the bat workers are.

Unknown: 2:06

What are the positive comments you get back from people after one of these sorts of events. Well, I mean, we're very fortunate people give us all sorts of feedback, often very constructive, because that when we're not perfect, we can always learn. But the things that do come up again and again, are people do really appreciate the time that the team put into developing the programme. And we're very fortunate that we can get some really great speakers and we get a real mix of speakers. So we will have academics who are often talking about some of their cutting edge science, it might not even have been published yet. So it's always really exciting to have some of that unpublished data and new trends and things that are being found. But we'll also have the bat groups telling us about the exciting things that they're doing. And of course, so much of the bat conservation is reliant on the citizen science that's going on all across the country. But we'll also sometimes have international speakers coming in to help us so I'm really looking forward to the National Conference, we've got Professor Emma Teeling coming as our keynote speaker coming over from Ireland. So that should be really exciting. I think there's a lot of people very keen to hear what she's got to say. So we're looking forward to that. But it is it's a real diverse mix. And, of course, we've got a lot of psychologists here as well. And so for them to be able to share their best practice and their experiences. And as new guidance and things come out. So we were lucky, we had Harry Fox here from Clarkson woods, talking about the new lighting guidance, which of course, is really useful for everyone to get that more insight into such a topical area.

Steve Roe: 3:38

And you mentioned the effort that goes into one of these, how long does it take to organise a conference or weekend like this,

Naomi Webster: 3:45

Usually longer than I'm hoping for. Just because, you know, we really do want to make sure that it goes as smoothly as possible. And just trying to anticipate all of the little needs plan, you know, all of the rooms, all the details with the venues. So in practical terms, we've got the pre venue visit to make sure we've got the space that we want. And so that will usually take a day just to get up and back from the venue. Having researched the options as well, we've then got the practical logistics of actually sorting out all the bookings and getting them in and some people are amazing and get their booking right first time and some people need a little bit more help. But we do want to make sure that everyone gets here on time. There's the liaison in advance with the bookings, we want to make sure that everyone's got all the information they need. So they can turn up at the right time at the right place with all the right kits that they're going to need. And then there's always the last minute tweaks and flexibility that we need. So particularly supporting our exhibitors as they come to share their wares and their technologies and things and making sure that they've got all the things that they need. Power is often one of the key things making sure I can get power to all of our exhibition stands on things. So just trying to think of all of these little elements try and bring it all together on the so that hopefully everyone has a really good time. And finally,

Steve Roe: 5:04

for somebody who's never been to BCT event before, what would you say to encourage them to get along to one of the

Naomi Webster: 5:11

I think the best thing is just hanging out with other people who are so passionate about bats. I sometimes I think we're in any field, it can feel a bit isolated sometimes that you are just the only person battling along in your little corner. But coming together with other people who are often facing similar challenges, or, you know, actually might even have solutions for problems that you're facing, but also to just be reinvigorated to hear about the really exciting projects that are being done. And hopefully to make some new friends, as I said earlier, that workers are really friendly. You know, you you know, you're coming to somewhere where you've automatically got something in common with people, because basically, everyone here thinks that's a great, so if you'd like that you should really be here.

Steve Roe: 5:51

What three words would you use to describe the bat conservation movement?

Naomi Webster: 5:56

I think obviously exciting because a lot of it is cutting edge. There's new stuff being discovered all the time, inspiring, how committed and how passionate people are giving up so much of their free time. So I think those are exciting, inspiring and needed, you know, bats and all biodiversity. And you know, the knock on effects are about conservation, in terms of benefiting other biodiversity as well. I think it's needed. So I think those are my three, exciting, inspiring and needed.

Steve Roe: 6:25

Naomi, thank you very much.

Unknown: 6:29

If that's inspired you to get along to the next bat conference, just head to bats.org.uk and hit the events and training button on the top menu or hit the link in the show notes below. The Bat Conservation Trust's Wales officer and species legislation and policy specialist Steve Lucas had been busy in the run up to the conference. And my first question to Steve was what's the weekend for

Steve Lucas: 6:50

The weekend brings it's primarily an event for for the bat workers, but what is in Wales will be do attracts, thankfully, very nicely, people from England as well. We're all part of the same community after all, and its way of bringing them together, bringing the community together so that we can exchange ideas, we can import new information and have a generally nice time.

Unknown: 7:14

Your biography on the BCT website says you grew up in Africa. How come you were out there?

Steve Lucas: 7:20

How come? Well, my father was working for the Uganda Development Corporation getting Uganda ready for independence. So I was born out there, along with my two brothers and sister came back to the UK in the summer of '61.

Steve Roe: 7:34

And have you always been in Wales? Or did you come back to elsewhere?

Steve Lucas: 7:36

No, no, we started off in Surrey, basically. And I lived all my life. You've really been sorry, or Guilford and then joined the army when I was 18. And it wasn't until oh, gosh, 1980, something like that. That I moved to Wales.

Steve Roe: 7:55

How long have you been living in Wales?

Steve Lucas: 7:58

Oh gosh. About 35 years now. So it's probably the longest time I've set roots in any one place in my life.

Unknown: 8:09

What was it about bats that drew you to come and work for BCT? How long ago did you join the team?

Steve Lucas: 8:14

So I joined just over 10 years ago, it'll be 11 years this June/July. I've been working in nature conservation for the last since 1990. And most of that was doing protected species. So I spent initial time working in the Wildlife Trust. Then I went to the Countryside Council for Wales as it was then I did two years of common to most government overseeing species licencing and then came back into CCW as protected species officer. So it's just a natural progression really to go into bands.

Steve Roe: 8:47

And you're the Bat Conservation Trust's Welsh bat officer, what does your job entail?

Steve Lucas: 8:52

So effectively, front up BCT in Wales, so I cover everything something to a certain extent, a lot of back group support because it's where are the basis of BCT is as a conservation movement. But there's also a lot of advocacy and policy work working with Welsh Governments and other bodies like Natural Resources Wales,

Unknown: 9:17

I should also say part your job title is also your the species legislation and policy policy specialists, for the listeners at home what you do as part of that role.

Steve Lucas: 9:25

So it is absolutely vitally important to get the policy and legislation creates if you don't get that right at the beginning, you're kind of wasting your time in many respects, you're sort of battling against the wind. So I've been doing I now work two days a week as a kind of a pseudo UK level, principally England and Wales, dealing with policy and legislation and that means talking with government officials. Working credibly closely with other NGOs. So we have wildlife and countryside link for England. We have Will's environmental income Wales. And it's working collaboratively to make sure we get shared messages across. And the greater benefit is in the collective.

Steve Roe: 10:10

Yeah. I'm guessing Brexit is now behind the big tasks of that role. I mean, we're recording this in May. So who knows? So the extension is currently the 31st of October. Yes, you think the future of that legislation looks like and in the light of Brexit,

Steve Lucas: 10:25

it's really difficult to think about what's going to happen if Brexit happens. I mean, that's the big issue. I think now. If it does, and we're obviously working towards that it will happen. The legislation as it currently stands is it's been all transposed from European directives into into EU legislation will be brought across into the UK and broadly speaking, is going to replicate what we've got, unfortunately, what we will then leave are all the principles and the governance watchdogs behind. And that's where we're having a lot of our focus of work is making sure that government understands that and puts in place, new structures to make sure that we can challenge governments and we keep those principles which is so vitally important.

Steve Roe: 11:14

So potentially big times.

Steve Lucas: 11:16

I think there are huge challenges ahead. I would say the legislation is in place ready to so that our next day, the law will still be the same. But it's what's going to come afterwards and I suspect that there will be perhaps reinterpretations of the law. And there will be some certain individuals who will be seeking to change it completely.

Steve Roe: 11:38

Yeah. What would you say the unique challenges about being about work in Wales as opposed to the rest of the UK?

Steve Lucas: 11:45

I don't know that there is a specific unique challenge for bat workers in Wales, obviously, the vast Wales has a population of about 3 million people. And most of those are centred around the Wrexham where we are here, Bangor across north Wales, and then along the M4 corridor in the south. So we have a massive chunk of Wales right in the middle, which has a very sparse population, and therefore, there are fewer people to cover a bigger area. So I think that's probably the biggest issue. And when it comes to things like bat care and rehabilitation, and members of the public phoning up, some people may have to travel long distances to go and meet people and collect bats and so on. So that's probably the biggest challenge that we have.

Steve Roe: 12:28

Where do you see the future of Wales Bat Conservation going?

Steve Lucas: 12:31

If I was to say, I think that the Welsh Government's really do have good ideas about the environments, of course as to play against other things. I suspect that bat conservation in Wales will be pretty good. But it comes down to policy and politics at the end of the day. So we'll have to wait and see on that. But it's, the indications are rosy are okay.

Unknown: 12:56

And why are these weekends important for wildlife conservation?

Steve Lucas: 12:59

Oh it's just bringing people together, which is great. So it's a great networking opportunity. And our weekends in particular, where we do field work, where else do you get 50 people 80 people out together surveying the financial contribution of that must be huge. And so people do have a great time when they come here. It's very laid back and we just get on with it.

Steve Roe: 13:23

Something we're doing on the podcast is asking people which three words they would use to describe about conservation.

Steve Lucas: 13:30

I always take great inspiration, when I come away from these events. People come together, and you think, Yep, we're all working together. And it's, and it's inspiring that you have so many people who volunteer their time, not just to come to these events, but in their day to day work with bat conservation. And that, for me is really great. And without that, I think we would be much, much poorer. That gives me hope for the future. So as long as everything else pans out, and it just gives me great enjoyment, to be honest.

Unknown: 14:02

Now, last time on BatChat, we spoke to Dan Hargreaves about the national Nathusius' pipistrelle project. And whilst I was over in Wales, I managed to grab a few minutes with Denise Foster from Carmarthenshire bat group who's leading the Welsh contingent of the Nathusius' project which started earlier this year. Denise, you're heading of the Welsh branch for the Nathusius' pipistrelle project. Why is this the year that Wales is getting involved in that project?

Denise Foster: 14:26

Well, there's been a national pipistrelle project by by Daniel Hargreaves and the BCT. Since 2014, Wales wasn't included in that project, and we had a talk by Daniel at the Welsh bat Workers Day last year, where he was trying to push for for the Welsh involvement. We have maternity colonies, a number of them in Northern Ireland. And so it's going to be interesting to see if that population are actually sort of migrating across to particularly to north Wales and all So going back again. So I think it's quite important to see if we have any movement with those pipistrelles from that particular colony, we also have a number of records down in the south Cardiff way. So they're obviously travelling along with sort of the estuary in that area. So again, it will be interesting to see if we can actually see their movements on the on the coastline and, you know, see where they're migrating from.

Unknown: 15:27

Okay. And last night, we all went out to it was about seven different sites we had? Yes. Was it, I mean, it was a training session for the world's back groups. How many bat workers did we have out last night? Oh, I think we must have had, we had seven teams. There was at least five per team. I believe. My and we went to a number of water bodies. It was a little bit on the cold side. But the weather conditions were quite good. Other than that there was there were bats flying. I think most groups, as far as I know, caught mainly soprano and common pipistrelles. No, no, Nathusius' were caught last night as far as I know. But it's early days, we've only just started the project.

Steve Roe: 16:10

And what's made you want to lead the projects. And well,

Unknown: 16:13

I've only just moved into Wales from Herefordshire, where I was leading a number of projects. So you know, and I like to get involved. I've worked with Daniel Hargreaves for many years, and been on various of his projects. And I thought, you know, I wanted a project to start in Wales, and I thought the, you know, working with Daniel, the BCT, couldn't, it couldn't be better.

Steve Roe: 16:33

And how many bank groups if you got taking part in the projects, once it starts running this year? We've got

Unknown: 16:38

seven accredited agents on the licence so far, two in the in the north and five in the south, some of these, Pete that these agents actually belong to a number of bat groups. So I think we're probably covers around about five bat groups so far. What do we know about Nathusius' pipistrelles in Wales at the moment from existing records?

Denise Foster: 16:59

Well, we've got about over 200 records. So far, some of them date back quite a quite a long time. I don't think I as far as I'm aware that we've only caught a few down in the Cardiff area. So that's all we really know about them, and none of those bats were ringing. So we're mainly whenever we catch these bats, it's mainly the male. So you know, the target is to try and get females, juveniles and try and then eventually is to radio track these bats until we can find some roads, but this that's a long way down the down the road, we need to find the sites first and then we'll target the trapping and the radio tacking.

Steve Roe: 17:39

And what do you hope to discover join the project, sort of whatever it seems.

Denise Foster: 17:44

I, personally, I would like to find at least a couple of maternity colonies, particularly in the north. And it will be I would like to see if there's a link between Northern Ireland and Wales, because it's not that far. So that's what I would like to see. And maybe in South Wales blagden Lake is a hotspot for Theseus. Not that far away. So let's see if we could if those those sites could be linked up.

Steve Roe: 18:12

And how long are you in visiting the projects running for into the future?

Denise Foster: 18:15

Well, the licence is currently for two years, I would say you know, at least five years, until we're either catching lots of them, or we're not catching any of them will you know, it will be run alongside the national project. So whatever they decide, well, we'll follow their protocols.

Steve Roe: 18:37

And something we're asking everyone is three words to describe the bat conservation movement, which three words would you choose

Unknown: 18:42

the 3 words. The Nathusius' project or particularly the bat itself would be nomadic, elusive, and maybe cosmopolitan. Great stuff, Denise, thank you very much. Thank you.

Steve Roe: 18:55

And finally, I sat down with Jean Matthews, who's a fellow trustee at BCT and has been living in Wales for around 30 years and also sits on the Natural England bat expert panel. I spoke to Jean about what it's like to be a bat worker in Wales. Then how did you get into bats? Did it start as a hobby or a career?

Jean Matthews: 19:11

It started as a hobby very much that I wanted to do something that was nothing to do with the work that I was doing. And I joined the Avon back group when I was living down there and met Gareth Jones, who was a student and he had a couple of nocturnal bats and I went to a talk where these nocturnal bats were a captive nocturnal bats and I met one of those and I was just completely captivated by it.

Steve Roe: 19:34

How long have you been living over in Wales?

Jean Matthews: 19:36

I moved up here there 30 years ago, so that's when I joined the Gwynedd bat group started training for my bat licence. And then I was lucky enough to get a job within a fairly short time as a seasonal species officer with the Nature Conservancy Council.

Steve Roe: 19:55

And what is it about bats that you love so much?

Jean Matthews: 19:58

I've always been a little levels sorts of wildlife and and animals and mammals particularly. And I think that's just fascinating because it's very difficult to know much about them, they come out in the dark when it's difficult to see them. And then we have lots of different species 17 Different species 18 Different species with different lifestyles in different ecologies. But they're very

Steve Roe: 20:21

And can you just tell us a bit about your career in cryptic. bats?

Unknown: 20:26

Well, I started as a regional species officer with in north Wales, and covering all protected species, but with a focus on that. And then gradually, I moved into a headquarters role, looking at bats over the whole of Wales and also working with other organisations like BCT, across the UK. And also, I was lucky enough to get to join the Eurobats advisory committee. So I've been extremely lucky to do local bat work, Wales, England and Wales, Scotland, and the UK and European as well. And you've worked for quite a last part of your career, NRW and CCW before that, what was your biggest achievement whilst working?

Jean Matthews: 21:13

I don't not sure about achievement. But the thing I enjoyed doing most, I think and think isn't one of the most valuable things was making sure that the lesser horseshoe bat monitoring programme has kept going. It's a long term monitoring set that started in 1993. And it's got a long run of data. And it's probably the probably the best recorded that species in in the UK, we've got the best data on those. It was a challenge sometimes to try and keep the funding going. Because people think you've done it once you've counted the months, you don't need to count them again. But the value of long term dataset is in the length of time.

Steve Roe: 21:52

And what have you seen changes over the time you've been involved in bat conservation.

Jean Matthews: 21:57

A lot of things have changed. Really, when when I first started, there are a lot of volunteer bat workers helping out doing roofs, physics, and helping householders. And the development sector was not very large. And that's that's changed completely. So there's a lot more professional bat workers, some of whom are volunteers as well, but you do, it is a definitely a changed environment really.

Unknown: 22:20

And you sit on that's England's panel, can you just tell us a bit more about that role, and what the panel's working on at the moment. The panel is trying to streamline the development licencing process really to make sure that things that are done, are proportional and more effective in delivering that conservation without focusing on things that are not really going to make that much difference.

Steve Roe: 22:44

And both of us sit on the Board of Trustees for BCT. What made you want to join the board?

Unknown: 22:51

I've worked with BCT in a number of roles, you know, with in my role at NRW get helping to get grants for BCT. And also sat on the back groups forum years ago. And I just really wanted to continue my involvement when I when I stopped working with NRW so it was a good opportunity to do that.

Steve Roe: 23:11

And which back group are you involved with at the moment? So and what projects does it have on the go?

Unknown: 23:17

Gwynedd bat group and main focus this year, we're looking at the easiest projects, which is the Wales-wide project that we've been working on this weekend. So we're looking at water bodies where we might find this easiest pipistrelle, it's it's more common over in Ireland, but it migrates across from Europe and we in Wales could be a stopping off point for the species or we may have residents we really don't know.

Steve Roe: 23:42

And how many members does Gwynedd group have at the moment?

Jean Matthews: 23:45

I think we have about 80 members but with a sort of core of about 10 to 15, who are active members.

Unknown: 23:52

And in terms of an in terms of the people who are active, what sorts of projects they get involved with, as well as the Nathusius' stuff. Are they doing roof visits? Or are they doing it in transit at work or stuff like that There's a small number of us doing roost visits, a lot of that work is done in Wales in our area by NRW. So we don't do quite as much for that. But we do a lot of bat walks. And if we've got time to organise it, we do something called a band camp where we descend on usually a country or state for a weekend and do lots of different survey methods. So it's partly training but partly getting information on that non the bats in the area.

Steve Roe: 24:32

And what have you seen signs and the time that you've been involved in bat conservation?

Jean Matthews: 24:38

I think as I said before, there's there's a lot more professional about workers and it's an industry now which it didn't used to be. There's a lot more research going on this, you know, lots of PhDs in bats and incredibly interesting information coming out, but we still, every time you learn something new, you realise there's an awful lot more we don't know. And I think the other thing as well is just to say that you know The words change biodiversity conservation was we started off with conservation and became biodiversity ecosystems, but it's still, it's still the same thing really, we still need to carry on doing it.

Steve Roe: 25:10

And finally, which three words would you use to describe the bat conservation movement?

Jean Matthews: 25:14

I'd say firstly essential because we really need to keep looking and focusing on our bats and making sure that they're safe in the long term. And urgent, I guess, because they're, they don't those species that don't breed quickly can't replace their numbers quickly, if anything happens to them. So we can't really take our eye off the ball. And enjoyable is the last one because you get to meet some nice people and some nice bats and go out and play in some interesting places.

Steve Roe: 25:44

And why are these weekends so important for that workers, both in Wales and in the UK,

Unknown: 25:49

It's a great chance to get out and meet meet bat workers, because it can be quite a lonely time being a bat worker, if you're just sitting outside a building, hoping some bats will come out, you might be on your own. And you get to learn things from other bat workers and look at different species and the ones you get in your own area, different habitat. So it's, it's fun as well,

Steve Roe: 26:11

Great stuff, Jean Matthews, thank you very much. Thank you. That's it for this episode. And indeed, for 2019, we're going to be taking a short break over the Christmas period. But we will be back on Wednesday, the eighth of January with the first of a two part special at the Natural History Museum. Here's a little clip.

Roberto Portela Miguez: 26:30

I knew that there was a colleague of mine, from Thailand coming to visit and he was particularly interested in renal fitness in general, we had a look at one of these pieces that was there. And then he noticed that particular specimen was quite different from the rest. He said, Oh, maybe this is a new species. So what do we need to do in order to verify this,

Steph West: 26:51

So museums have to change, science is changing, conservation is changing. And museums very much have to keep up with that. I mean, the reason we built the Darwin centre 10 years ago was to have better facilities for collection storage, but part of that is around storage of genetic material as well. And that is very much how the museum is going forward.

Unknown: 27:12

Don't forget to subscribe to BatChat. And that means the first episode of that two part special will automatically arrive on your smart device in January. Until then, the Bat Conservation Trust wishes you all a Merry Christmas and a very happy new year.