New hedgerows are helping to improve the habitat of dormice

Farmer Simon Oliver has been working with Defra on a number of measures, including planting new hedgerows.

His Hill Farm at Cradley adjoins a wildlife site which is a known stronghold for the species.

The hedgerows will provide routes for the colony in Beacon Hill Wood to move out on to the farmland. He says there has already been activity.

'Nibbled nuts'

Mr Oliver said: "My work really seems to be paying off - in the last few weeks we've already seen nibbled nuts and suchlike, giving evidence that the dormice have woken up from hibernation and are living happily in my hedgerows.

"Apparently, they prefer to inhabit hazel woodland with bramble, so I've tried to reflect this in my newly-planted hedgerows, which are made up of species which provide known food sources for dormice: hazel, ash, field maple and dog rose, with some hawthorn and blackthorn.

"I've made a real effort to plant all gaps in the hedgerows, allowing the dormice to roam all over the farmland."

Its numbers have decreased dramatically in the last 100 years. Emily Ledder, Defra

Emily Ledder, Countryside Stewardship Scheme Adviser with Defra's Rural Development Service in Worcester, said: "We are delighted that Simon Oliver has undertaken such extensive work on his farmland.

"We are keen to encourage farmers and landowners across Herefordshire to follow Mr Oliver's lead, and to take measures to enable the dormouse to flourish in the county as it once did.

"The dormouse is really in need of proactive conservational activity like this, as its numbers have decreased dramatically in the last 100 years, becoming extinct in 7 counties - in fact, it now occupies only half of its former range."