News & Views

BSG Ecology’s Guy Miller, one of our licenced bat ecologists, supported by Adam Long (Access Techniques Ltd), an industrial rope access specialist, has recently conducted aerial surveys of the Grand Bridge at Blenheim Park, Oxfordshire. The aim has been to identify and inspect features of the bridge that have the potential to support roosting bats and nesting birds. The resulting information will be used to inform the approach taken to forthcoming repair work, ensuring that it is legally compliant and that opportunities for birds and bats are retained within the structure following renovation.
11 December, 2019

During winter 2019/20 ecologist Emily Moore has taken a sabbatical to travel and to work with the African Bat Conservation Trust. She has been involved in research in relation to the ecology of various bat species, including little epauletted fruit bat, white-bellied free-tailed bat, yellow-bellied house bat, and Egyptian slit-faced bat, and has also taken part in local projects to raise awareness of the benefits of healthy bat populations to ecosystems and local communities.

06 December, 2019
We are delighted to announce that the Walthamstow Wetlands project was successful in the ‘Adding Value through Landscape’ category at the 2019 Landscape Awards. BSG Ecology were involved in the project for over seven years, designing the ornithological survey protocol, the results of which were critical to informing the Habitats Regulations Assessment of the proposals and the design of the scheme, and co-ordinating consultation with Natural England.
29 November, 2019

Walthamstow Wetlands is among the contenders in the ‘Adding Value through Landscape’ category at the Landscape Institute Awards, 2019. Peter Shepherd will be attending the event in London on 28 November at the invitation of the project lead Kinnear Landscape Architects (KLA) Ltd. BSG Ecology were instrumental in guiding the vision for this large-scale (new) urban nature reserve through the Habitats Regulations Assessment process.

21 November, 2019
BSG Ecology's Peter Newbold and Sarah Joscelyne recently delivered training aimed at providing recent Natural England recruits with a better understanding of the practicalities of survey and mitigation for great crested newts.  The training was delivered over two days at O&H Hampton's Crown Lakes and Western Peripheral Road sites, where BSG has been overseeing mitigation and habitat creation aimed at various species under a multi-species project-wide mitigation licence.
28 October, 2019
BSG Ecology’s Owain Gabb and James Garside were among the speakers at the Swansea University Employability Event on 23 October 2019. The event was set up to provide second year Biosciences students with insight into the range of career options available to them. Our talk naturally concerned ecological consultancy as one obvious potential career pathway.
25 October, 2019
BSG Ecology is delighted to be exhibiting at Regen Conference in Liverpool on 6-7 November 2019. Please visit Stand C4 where our experienced team will be delighted to discuss all-matters ecology, including issues related to bats, great crested newts and other protected species, brownfield habitats and our experience with biodiversity net gain.
22 October, 2019
The footage below shows lesser horseshoe bats Rhinolophus hipposideros emerging from a stone shed that supports a maternity roost. It was captured in early August 2019 by BSG Ecology’s Guy Miller and Hannah Daniels, using one of BSG Ecology’s FLIR T650sc thermal imaging cameras. The location is near Abergavenny, Monmouthshire.
15 August, 2019
Recent months have seen a change in momentum in terms of biodiversity net gain, with the various components needed to drive the process: the policy; the Defra Metric, and some of the detail of how the process will work all taking significant steps forward. This article provides an overview of the evolution of the process to date, explores the emerging implications of policy, and reflects on the change in dynamic between planning authorities and developers that is likely to occur now that biodiversity net gain is a policy requirement in England.
09 August, 2019