The Great Crested Newt

A charming fellow, I'm sure you'll agree.

They grow to about 15-18cm; average life as around ten years but they can live as long as 27 years in captivity (but would you want to?). I bet you're glad I'm here aren't you?

They're widespread across Europe, live in wetlands, are nocturnal and chill out for the days under leaves, rocks etc in wet areas, all over the country. In Spring the males develop an impressive crest along their backs and tails, don't we all?

They're also designated as a protected species under Schedule 5 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. They're not daft. Touch, harm or damage one of these and you could receive a £5,000 fine.

If you're planning to build something - a railway line perhaps, or let's say 5,000 much-needed new homes, a couple of (five) primary schools and a secondary school, healthcare facilities, roads etc, on an urban extension perhaps (green field but on the edge of a tired town as part of a regeneration scheme to bring new homes, jobs, infrastructure, prosperity to the place), and you find one of these little chaps in say June, things can get a tad awkward.

Because under the act you cannot build anything at all within 500 metres of where you found him. Not without 'mitigation' at any rate. I now have the undivided attention of all prospective NIMBYs out there. But hell they all know this stuff. If you're a NIMBY and not cultivating these chaps ready to drop them quietly all over the place you're not worthy of the name!

And 'mitigation' doesn't mean building a pond somewhere else, oh no, you have to wait until next April and May, and employ grown adults to put on wellies and get on their hands and knees to find your newt and all his family, cousins, distant relatives (they have up to 300 offspring in a year, each), collect them up, gently, and move them to another suitable habitat. And to ensure that they don't return home (they're 'homing newts' presumably) you have to erect newt fences (this is no word of a lie) - here's proof -

to make sure they don't get back onto your site. Now if you could give them hard hats and high-viz vests... oh no they're quite shy.

The above image is genuinely of newt fences - you have probably seen them at the side of roads and wondered what they were? If not you will notice them now, and know what they are. You're welcome.

These surveys and collections and the rehousing process can only take place in April and May, by law, so you may have planning permission, have sold 'off plan' to Mr & Mrs Helptobuy, and have hundreds of builders, plumbers, sparkys, plasterers and decorators ready and willing to crack on, but you have to wait until next April and May for the survey, the collection, the re-visit, the follow-up survey etc. So August then when you found the little chap the June before last. And this is not just to appease Natural England (who administer the Act); oh no, the local planning authority cannot grant you permission to go ahead if there is an issue with Great Crested Newts. They come to all the planning meetings, but usually in disguise.  

Meanwhile Mr & Mrs Helptobuy are living in a lovely council B&B (not) with their new addition Marcie Helptokeepawakeatnight. But that's OK because the Great Crested Newt is protected by European law.

Because it's an endangered species. In Europe.

The thing is, it's not an endangered species in the UK. Far from it. Current estimates are that there are around 400,000 of the little chaps on 18,000 breeding sites in the UK all alive and well, and living in beautifully manicured new homes. Yes the bloody fences are a pain in the crest when you want to go to the shops for a bag of insects and some larvae and hummus perhaps, but they're doing really rather well. The population was in decline in the 70s but has now recovered and is thriving in the UK.

I wonder how many Great Crested Newts they're going to find along the route of the proposed HS2?

Still, that's conservation for you, EU style.

That's all from Newts at Ten.

Thanks for reading.