RAUK - Archived Forum - non native animals in the uk

Hi Morpheus,

Alpine newts are definetely established, i.e. they breed in the UK

Red eared terrapins and sliders crop up in the wild regularly, no confirmed reports of successful breeding in natural conditions though. So they are probably pets that have been released.

I've removed firebelied toads from garden ponds.. I think it is possible for them to breed in the wild in the UK, but have never seen direct evidence such as tadpoles or toadlets myself.

Morpheus

technically once captured you cannot release it back into the wild - if it is listed under the Wildlife & Countryside Act 1981 Section 14 -

You would require a license from DEFRA to release non native animals (under section 14 WCA 1981) back into the wild - legally - and only into areas where they were captured from -

So best not to catch them and try and get in situ photos......

Jon

triturus carnifex, italian crested newt has been introduced into several sites, not good news for native caudates, especially great crested newts.

introduced birds include:

ring necked pheasant, golden pheasant, lady amhurst pheasant, red legged partridge, ruddy duck, little owl, ring necked parakeet, mandarin duck, egyptian goose.

plus reintroduced birds such as:

gadwall, goshawk, red kite, white tailed sea-eagle, capercaille etc

Hi

I am going to tell you about something I did last summer (sounds like a film title) which will probably alarm some of you,and after becoming a regular reader of this site I probably wouldn't do it a second time.

I live on the North west Coast of England about 100 yards from the sea which can be pretty windswept at times, however all the back gardens face each other in what can be best described as a very small valley creating a bit of a suntrap.At the bottom of my garden I have a 20 foot long wall covered in trellis with well established evergreen Honeysuckle growing on it.The wall is south facing and in the summer has the sun on it from about 9.00am to 19.00pm

I have always felt a bit sorry for myself thinking (until recently) that I lived an area where none of our native Herps were present.

I have never liked keeping animals in captivity but I do keep Green Anoles in a large viv (2mtre x 1mtre x1mtre) in my basement the wife woun't have it anywhere else(wish I could do a swap).

I had often wondered how they might cope living in our climate especially with global warming becoming a reality,(I have noticed a change in the weather over the last 10 years),so on Fathers day of last year I released 2 males and 2 females onto the back wall.

It was a baptism of fire for them,that night it absolutely poured down and I didn't expect to see them ever again,but having said that they would experience much worse in their native Florida in the hurricane season and sure enough by lunch time of the next day all 4 were there sunning themselves on the trellis.

They stayed there all summer, they could have up and left and gone anywhere but the position obviously suited them.During this time I saw them behaving as you would expect in their natural habitat,hunting for food,displaying,fighting,mating and sunning themselves.This they did for most of the day unlike our native species maybe, it wasn't quite warm enough for them but taking temp readings on the material they were basking on the readings were above 30degs most of the time.I did look but I never found any eggs.

We have a cat but I keep her well fed and she wears a bell at all times but there are at least 8 other cats in the gardens around mine and they do visit on occasions but they never seemed interested in what was on the wall above them.Maisie (our cat) would sit and watch with amusement but I never saw her make any attempt to catch any of them,maybe because of where they were,a vertical wall with dense vegitation on it.

It's a great feeling sitting on your patio at 7.30am drinking a cup of coffee before going to work and watching a lizard 2 feet away drinking the dew off a leaf.

Up until the 14/10/05 I saw all 4, by the 23/10/05 I had caught 3 and put them back in their viv I never found the last female, it was getting cold by then and she may have  gone too deep into the vegetation for me to find her.The only way I could catch them was to find where they were sleeping the night before then go out early the next morning and take them before they warmed up. They would usually sleep in the same place each night but this was governed by where the sun was shining at the end of the day, once the temp was above 10 degs they were too fast for me.

When I caught them they were the healthiest I had ever seen them,a beautiful shape and their colours were so vivid, they are still alive today.

They were left to fend for themselves mainly,I would sometimes release some crickets on the wall which the house sparrows soon took advantage of but apart from that they fed themselves. I saw them taking flies, catapilars, crickets and spiders, there were also slugs, snails, hoverflies,and woodlice about but I never saw them take any of them.If I hadn't seen them for a while the easiest way to bring them into view was to spray the Honeysuckle with water, they were soon out having a drink.

It was such a good feeling knowing they were surviving and in fact thriving in my garden and I used to spend hours watching them.

The warmer months of our climate our obviously suitable for a lot of other reptiles but the winter months arn't so accomodating.On Christmas eve I found the last female in the middle of the patio,quite healthy looking, quite plump but dead.Why she was in the middle of the Patio I don't know, none of them had left the wall during the summer, I only saw one drop to the floor to catch a cricket but he was soon up the wall again.Maybe she was trying to make her way in from the cold on her own but it did answer my last question could they survive a English winter?......NO. 

Cheers, Ray

Hi

Found some pics sorry about the quality

Mark,

Are those Pms from the Boscombe colony ?

Nah - those are Ventnor Walls surely

Jon

Try and get a count of animals and the distance travelled - I think that this would be good to collate to help assess the status of the wall lizard in England

Jon