L. Harrison Matthews - Mammals in the British Isles

COPYRIGHT

William Collins

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

WilliamCollinsBooks.com

This eBook edition published by William Collins in 2019

First published 1982

Copyright © L. Harrison Matthews 1982

L. Harrison Matthews asserts his moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

Black and white reproduction by

Adroit Photo-Litho Ltd, Birmingham

HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication .

Source ISBN 9780007417643

Ebook Edition © FEBRUARY 2019 ISBN: 9780007406562

Version: 2019–02–26

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[Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9780007406562]

EDITORS

Margaret Davies, C.B.E., M.A., Ph.D.

Kenneth Mellanby, C.B.E., Sc.D.

S.M. Walters, M.A., Ph.D.

PHOTOGRAPHIC EDITOR

Eric Hosking, F.R.P.S.

The aim of this series is to interest the general reader in the wild life of Britain by recapturing the inquiring spirit of the old naturalists. The Editors believe that the natural pride of the British public in the native fauna and flora. to which must be added concern for their conservation, is best fostered by maintaining a high standard of accuracy combined with clarity of exposition in presenting the results of modern scientific research.

CONTENTS

COVER

TITLE PAGE

COPYRIGHT

Note to Readers

PLATES

EDITORS’ PREFACE

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

1. The Mammals of the British Isles

2. Ice Ages

3. The Evolution of the Environment

4. Distribution and Habitats

5. Ranges, Territories and Populations

6. Social Behaviour

7. Behaviour and the Environment

8. Communication

9. Internal and External Rhythms

10. Man and the other Mammals

PICTURE SECTION

APPENDIX

REFERENCES

INDEX

FOOTNOTES

ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

PLATES

1. Hedgehog in nest; young hedgehog ( G. Kinns )

2. Common shrew ( G. Kinns ), pygmy shrew ( G. Kinns ); lesser white-toothed shrew ( D. Hosking )

3. Water shrew ( G. Kinns ); noctule bat ( J.H.D. Hooper )

4. Roost of greater horseshoe bats in a cave ( J.H.D. Hooper ); the rare mouse-eared bat in flight ( S.C. Bisserôt )

5. Water vole ( D. Hosking ); bank vole ( G. Kinns ); field vole’s nest ( G. Kinns )

6. Yellow-necked mouse; wood mouse burrow; harvest mouse and summer nest ( G. Kinns )

7. Common dormouse; edible or fat dormouse ( G. Kinns )

8. Runway of common rat ( G. Kinns ); common rat feeding ( G. Kinns ); introduced coypu ( L.M. Gosling )

9. Mountain hare ( B. Tulloch ); brown hare ( G. Kinns )

10. Red squirrel ( A.L. Goodson ); grey squirrel in its den ( F.W. Lane ); litter of fir cones ( G. Kinns )

11. Badger with old bedding; overlapping fox and badger territories ( G. Kinns )

12. Country fox cubs ( G. Kinns ); town fox raiding a dustbin ( D. Hosking )

13. A hunting weasel ( G. Kinns ); mink ( F.W. Lane )

14. Tracks of an otter in snow ( B. Tulloch ); wild cat from the highlands of Scotland ( G. Kinns )

15. Common seals on a sandbank in the Wash ( R.W. Vaughan ); grey seal ( G. Kinns )

16. Two red stags; red deer-stag ‘roaring’; stag showing flehmen action ( T. Clutton-Brock )

EDITORS’ PREFACE

IT IS NOW over 30 years since Dr Matthews wrote his British Mammals , which was No. 21 in the New Naturalist series. The Editors then described it as ‘the most important book on British mammals that has ever been published, bringing together as it does an enormous number of facts into a new synthesis’. The reviewers and our public fully endorsed this opinion, and the book has been a continuing success ever since it was published. It is still the most useful volume in its field, and owners of copies will treasure them on their shelves, and make use of them in their studies, for many years to come.

British Mammals , when it was published, was topical and very up to date, bringing together the results of Dr Matthews’ own observations and the research of many other mammalogists. Since then the subject has made great progress, often stimulated by Dr Matthews’ own writings. As a result there was need for considerable addition to the original text, even though there was little that newer investigations had shown to require correction. British Mammals was already a long book, though every word of its text was interesting and worth reading. Further extensions and revisions would have produced a volume which, in today’s circumstances, would have been so expensive as to have been out of reach of many of those for whom it was intended – ‘the general reader interested in wildlife’.

It was for this reason that we persuaded Dr Matthews to produce an entirely new book. It is in no way a revision of the 1952 publication. Although considerably shorter than its predecessor, it covers all facets of the life of the mammals of the British Isles. Like others in this series, it is not a text book. Several admirable volumes of this nature are now available; this has made it possible to reduce the description of the species to a minimum. Once more the author has produced a synthesis of modern knowledge, which treats mammals as living creatures, living in and adapted to their environment. We are confident that it will meet a real need of today’s readers, and that it is a worthy successor to the author’s previous volume.

AUTHOR’S PREFACE

THIRTY years have passed since my volume ‘British Mammals’ was published as No. 21 in the New Naturalist series, and a large amount of new information has come to hand during that time. The cost of resetting a fully revised new edition was too expensive for the publishers to face; I had therefore to insist that it should be allowed to go out of print – I could not let readers be fobbed off with so out-of-date a book. Paradoxically, the publishers then asked me to write a new and different book on our mammals, and here it is.

I have tried to give a general picture of the British mammals and the things influencing their numbers and distribution both now and in the past, together with the history and development of their environment. I then examine various aspects of their biology, dealing with them as living animals in the field rather than as captives in the laboratory or preserved specimens in museums. I have avoided elaborating technical points of anatomical structure unless they are relevant to matters of function and physiology. In a land so densely populated as the British Isles the paths of animal and man inevitably cross at many places, so I conclude with an account of such relationships and a consideration of the measures man has taken for the control and conservation of his fellow mammals.