Dormouse (animal)

Signs of presence

Nest: ovoid construction of good about fifteen centimetres in diameter made of brushwood, foams, sheets, grasses dry with side opening. The interior is papered of soft material: tease, hairs, feathers, grass. The nest is often built in a hollow of tree, a crack of rock, an old wall, an old nest of magpie or of squirrel or can be freely in the branches, with average height. The same nest can shelter several individuals. The nesting boxes with small sparrows are not appropriate to him: the bore of flight is insufficient. The nests of hibernation are established in the ground, with depths going from 15 to 60 cm.

Prints: similar to those of the squirrel, but moreover small size.

Reproduction

Time: low settings from June to September.

Gestation: 30 to 32 days.

Many young people: 1 to 11 per range, generally 4 to 6; an annual range.

Sexual maturity: as soon as possible towards 9 to 10 months, i.e. in spring which follows the year of their birth.

Life expectancy: up to 9 years.

Hibernation: October at March-April

Statute of protection

Europe: appendix III of the Convention of Bern: protected space, being able to be the subject of taking away if the density of its populations allows it.

Walloon region: protected space since March 1983.

Geographical distribution

The dormouse is in Europe from the chain of Cantabric to the area of Kazan (Tatarie) and in the Caucasus. It is present in the north of Turkey, in Corsica, Sardinia and Sicily but is absent from Atlantic edge of France as well as large plains of Germany of north. One does not find it in Scandinavia and, in British Isles, only a small introduced population remains in the south-east of England. In altitude, it hardly exceeds 1500 m in the Alps and 2000 m in the Pyrenees. It is also present in Central Asia until the Pakistan. In Belgium, the dormouse is regularly only in Gaume. Fortuitous observations were carried out well in the north of this zone, in particular in Dutch Limbourg, but they were transported animals, probably within balls of straw imported of France. A dormouse captured at last century (1888) “around Dining” figure in the collections on the royal Institute of the natural science.

In France, it is present safe everywhere in the North-West of North-Picardy at Brittany and in Aquitaine. It reaches the Atlantic coast only in maritime Charente and in the Basque Country.

Food mode

The mode of the dormouse is at base vegetarian. Its preferred food is the dry seeds and fruits: nipples, Faîne S, sweet chestnuts, nut and hazel nuts. Other fruits appear in the menu when the opportunity arises: apples, plums, blackberries, bilberries, figs, pears. He likes also the buds and the flowers, also eats mushrooms and bark readily the starts-up. He does not scorn the insects, shellfish (woodlice) or certain molluscs and repaît the small vertebrate ones occasionally, in particular young birds which he finds with the nest. In autumn, the dormice fatten enormously and store a little food, thus constituting good energy reserves to face the long period of hibernation.

Habitat

The dormouse is an animal never very abundant and, in most of its surface of distribution, it is extremely rare. He lives mainly in the caducifoliées forests, in particular the hêtraies and the oak groves but lives also the parks, the orchards, the formations buissonnantes and the edges. He adopts readily the cover of forest huts and can return in the houses.

Territory-behavior

The dormouse is primarily night and rather seldom comes on the ground. He lives in couple or sedentary small groups family on a territory from approximately 3 to 4 hectares, which, for a rodent, is rather considerable. The populations include/understand approximately half of animals of less than one year, 30% individuals having from 1 to 2 years, 15% from 2 to 3 years and 5% beyond.

Predatory, Parasitic

As for the others gliridés, the principal predatory ones of the dormouse are the night raptors, in particular owl large-duke ( Bubo bubo ) and tawny owl ( Strix aluco ). Among the carnivores, it is especially the marten ( Martes martes ), the wildcat ( Felis sylvestris ) and, to a lesser extent, the long pitchfork ( Martes foina ) which count the dormouse with the number of their preys. Following the example that of the lérot ( Eliomys quercinus ) and muscardin ( Muscardinus avellanarius ), the skin which surrounds the tail of the dormouse is likely to tear when the animal is seized by there. The predator finds itself then with a sleeve furnished with hairs and the prey which he coveted had time to escape. The caudal vertebrae exposed end by being desiccated and falling. It is not rare to find, in nature, of the mutilated animals of the kind which seem to carry out a perfectly normal life.

On the plan parasitologic, the dormouse is much less well-known than his/her two cousins. The same parasites are known to him: it is mainly the chip of the squirrel, ( Monopsyllus sciurorum ), but also of a louse ( Schizophthirus pleurophaeus ) and about a chip ( Myoxopsylla laverani ) specific of gliridés.

Protection and conservation

It proves to be essential to make be reproduced the dormouse on the red list of the species as envisaged by Article 41 of the law on the nature conservation modified by decree of September 7th, 1989.

Implementation of the protection zones the special of the cuestas sinémurienne and bajocian should make it possible to ensure an adequate management of leafy forest cover according to ecological criteria. The habitat of the dormouse would be seen preserved thus better.

In Belgium, the dormouse remains a species rather badly known. It would be useful to start in this country a program of inventory and monitoring. Thus, any agent of the forests which would carry out an observation of dormouse is invited to make state of it, with the most details possible and by locating very precisely its discovery, with the Service Nature conservation of the Area. The agents most concerned are those of quarterings of Arlon, Virton and Florenville.

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