“Great crested newts are well known amongst developers and land managers who have heard many horror stories about huge sums of money invested in the protection of one newt!”


Common Lizard Great Crested Newt


haven for reptile and amphibian species, that are at risk due to a decline in suitable habitat and, by ensuring appropriate management works, their presence may go unnoticed.


Great Crested Newts


These amphibians are most often seen in water, although they are only usually present in ponds between mid-March and mid-June. During this time, the males will perform complex courtship displays and the females will lay the resulting eggs within the pond’s vegetation. Each egg is individually wrapped within the leaves of the aquatic vegetation. The adult newts will then leave the ponds and forage within woodlands, scrub and rough grassland, using habitat corridors such as hedgerows, to move between suitable sites. Newts will forage at night time and will usually move only in temperatures higher than 5O damper nights.


C, and particularly on


During daylight, newts are most commonly found in damp, dark places,


such as under rocks or in piles of vegetation. The juvenile newts, which are aquatic and possess gills, live for around three months in the water. During this time they will grow rapidly and, eventually, will lose their gills and leave the ponds. They will then live on land for up to three years until they are sexually mature, when they will return to the ponds to breed. A small number of juvenile newts will not undergo this process in their first year, and will remain in the pond over winter until the following year, when they will lose their gills and become terrestrial. Great crested newts are carnivorous and will feed mainly on insects, although they have been known to eat other newts.


Reptiles


Reptiles will hibernate over winter in dry places that are free from frost, including features such as old rabbit burrows, compost heaps and rubble mounds. They will begin to emerge from hibernation in spring, when they will first seek to mate before foraging continually over the summer. Adders, common lizards and slow worms will incubate their eggs within their body and will lay ‘live young’ in late summer. Grass snakes, however, will lay eggs in June/July, in rotting vegetation that will incubate the eggs for them. The eggs will then hatch in late summer. Juvenile common lizards and slow worms will then forage on small invertebrates, while juvenile grass snakes forage on amphibians and fish, and


adders will forage on small mammals and lizards. In order to fulfil all of these stages in their lifecycle, reptiles need a range of habitats in relatively close proximity to one another, although adult grass snakes can maintain a home range stretching up to 5km. Ideally, reptiles require open areas where they can bask in the sun in order to warm up for their day’s activities. However, in close proximity they also need more overgrown, rough areas where they can retire to if they sense danger. They also require good foraging habitat, which may include ponds and rough grassland, as they forage on small mammals, amphibians and invertebrates.


Ideal environments


It can be seen that the conditions provided by golf courses, with waterbodies, rough, fairways and footpaths, provide an ideal mixture of habitats that can satisfy the requirements of both reptiles and amphibians, without too much additional work from the course management.


Heathland golf courses, of which there


are many fine examples across the whole of the UK, provide possibly the best habitats for amphibians and reptiles, with the perfect mix of habitats for warmth, shelter, foraging and dry conditions suitable for hibernation. However, all golf courses can offer some potential for these species, and simple steps can be taken to consider the


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