The hazel dormouse is an agile climber and mainly nocturnal so is rarely seen. They live in deciduous woodland, hedgerows and dense scrub and spend most of the spring and summer up in the branches rarely coming down to the ground. They eat buds, hazelnuts, berries and insects.
They build summer nests of grasses, stripped honeysuckle bark and fresh hazel leaves in which the female will give birth to up to seven young. They hibernate during the winter months, either on the ground - under logs, leaves, in grass tussocks and at the base of trees - or just beneath the ground where the temperature is more constant.
The hazel dormouse is suffering from the loss and lack of management of its preferred habitats (woodland, hedgerows and dense scrub). It is also thought displacement by the introduced edible dormouse (Glis glis) is a problem in the Chilterns. Local Wildlife Trusts are helping by monitoring dormice populations, providing nestboxes and actively managing their preferred habitats appropriately. Coppicing, ride widening, thinning and glade creation in woodland creates the successional stage of woody vegetation preferred by dormice.
