The common dormouse isn’t really a mouse, nor is it nowadays particularly common. This strangely endearing little rodent is seldom seen – being both nocturnal and arboreal – and is a byword for somnolence, spending up to three-quarters of its life asleep.
Our two British species are markedly different. The smaller, native common or ‘hazel’ dormouse (Muscardinus avellanarius) is more murine in appearance, whereas the much larger ‘edible’ variety (Myoxus glis – once fattened in earthenware jars as an ancient Etruscan delicacy) is bushier tailed and somewhat resembles a young grey squirrel. Originally introduced by Walter Rothschild at Tring Park in 1902, the latter’s population is largely confined to the Chilterns, where they can be a household pest, gnawing at cables and even biting humans.
The common dormouse is widely distributed across Europe and Asia Minor, but, here, its presence is patchy, with heartlands remaining in Surrey, Devon, Kent and central Wales.
It has seldom been found north of Durham and is absent from Scotland and Ireland. It was once more widespread and, in Victorian times, was often tamed as a pet; Beatrix Potter kept one and the naturalist Thorburn had a dozing-mouse that established its dormitory in his canvas sketching umbrella.
With a body measuring 3in and a tail of similar length, he’s a natty little fellow with a pointed face, prominent dark eyes and lively vibrissae. The soft pelage varies from a demerara-sugar hue to reddish or even black, but it’s not waterproof, making misty mornings or damp summers a misery.
The long, feathery tail (one in 10 of which is white-tipped) is covered in such delicate skin that it will easily peel off – a way of eluding the grasp of such predators as badgers and tawny owls. Folklore asserts that the little golden derrymouse is immune to the venom of vipers.
Dormice (the plural somehow sounds especially pleasing) frequent the fringes of deciduous woodlands – a similar habitat to nightingales – with a preference for second-growth chestnut, beech and hazel.
They seldom descend to ground level, but are agile aloft in the canopy of branches and, being double-jointed, can run down trunks headfirst. A decline in the practice of rotation coppicing – once vital for charcoal and wattle-pole production – has reduced dormouse numbers, which have shrunk by some 38% since 2000. The current UK estimate is about 45,000.
When they emerge in May from their five months of hibernation, dormice first feed on hawthorn pollen, then on honeysuckle nectar. Their diet is seasonal and includes aphids and caterpillars in summer, then the berry harvest of autumn.
Possessing no caecum, they can’t digest the cellulose content of most leaves. Hazelnuts are their chief delight, which they tackle while they’re still soft and green on the bough; the protein-rich kernels are extracted by nibbling a cavity that leaves telltale chisel-marks inside its rim.
By the end of October, the dormouse must double the reserves of its body fat in preparation for winter.
Although the origin of its English name is obscure, I’ve always liked the idea that it derives from dormeuse (a type of nightcap). Generally sluggish by day, the dormouse additionally enters periods of extended torpor in summer – a state of aestivation that can render it vulnerable. It may be found in three different types of nest.
The spherical summer nest is grapefruit-sized, usually located several feet off the ground and often fashioned from honeysuckle bark. The breeding nest – being prepared in June – is larger and lined with thistledown (they’re notably clean creatures). The hibernaculum is constructed on or below ground, frequently in leaf litter.
From October until late spring, the ‘seven-sleeper’ slumbers beneath tree stumps or in haystacks, tail swept around its face, wheezing gently. Its heartbeat drops to one tenth of the normal rate to minimise consumption of energy. Mild winters don’t suit the dormouse, as any awakenings expend precious bodily reserves. Climate change is not proving kind to them.
Unusually for a small mammal, the hazel mouse produces a single, late litter (wood mice can manage six litters a year). Breeding peaks in June, but little is known of its love life. Perhaps because it spends just a quarter of its lifespan awake, the dormouse is blessed with longevity, living up to four years (the vole has a life expectancy of just six months).
The most celebrated literary dormouse appears in the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party, where it’s being used as a cushion and speaks of treacle wells. Somewhat improbably, because of the hallucinogenic associations of Wonderland’s hookah-sucking caterpillar, this scene features in the narco-lyrics of Jefferson Airplane’s song White Rabbit, which ends: ‘Remember what the dormouse said/ Feed your head, feed your head.’
Carroll’s creation more endearingly maintains: ‘I wasn’t asleep… I heard every word you fellows were saying.’
Credit: Alamy
11 fascinating facts about the hazel dormouse
With this shy litle creature being reintroduced into woodland areas in an attempt to halt its extinction, we reveal 11
A simple guide to the wildflowers of Britain
At long last Spring seems to be here — and with it, the natural flora that give so much pleasure.
A simple guide to identifying British trees
Simon Lester goes out on a limb to identify species and stop us barking up the wrong tree.
-
Six beautiful homes around the world, from Portofino to Provence to Palm BeachAn exquisite villa tucked into a hillside? A A breathtaking apartment created to make you feel like you're flying through the endless blue skies?
-
The 'greatest battle for 300 years': England's great estates face up to a green futureThe climate crisis will affect us all. All over Britain, major landowners are stepping up to tackle a warming world and biodiversity loss.
-
The 'greatest battle for 300 years': England's great estates face up to a green future
The climate crisis will affect us all. All over Britain, major landowners are stepping up to tackle a warming world and biodiversity loss.
-
'He unleashed a series of war cries, then intercepted the vole mid-air': There's nothing remotely common about the common kestrelKnown in Orkney as ‘moosie-haak’, kestrels are fierce hunters but have seriously declined and are now an amber-listed species.
-
The truth about P.G. Wodehouse: Robert Daws on playing England's greatest comic writerThe actor Robert Daws starred alongside Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie in Jeeves and Wooster back in the 1990s, and the work of P.G. Wodehouse has been part of his decades-long career ever since. He joined the Country Life Podcast.
-
Don't judge a plant by its smell: Why 'the little stinkers of the natural world' are just doing their jobReminiscent of love and with an unmistakable odour of death, the little stinkers of the natural world might incite repulsion, but they are only doing their job, pleads Ian Morton
-
Puffins and shearwaters, skuas and terns, gannets and gulls and guillemots and wings, these are a few of our favourite things (seabirds)From a heroic long-distance swimmer to a producer of spectacularly eerie sound effects, the seabirds seen swooping and diving over British waters have all manner of singular skills.
-
The red kite is a soaraway success story, having escaped extinction to become a familiar sight in our skies againUnhurried in flight and with a sideline in stolen goods, the handsome red kite is the gentleman thief of the raptor world, writes Mark Cocker.
-
‘This isn't just silver — it's a story of a man who fell in love with a woman who society deemed unworthy': The large silver sculpture of rutting stags that scandalised Victorian societyGeorge Harry Grey, the 7th Earl of Stamford, was shunned when he married a circus performer. This sculpture was his way of showing the world that he was a fighter — and it's now been acquired by the National Trust.
-
The life that thrives among the dead: How wildlife finds a home in the graveyards and churchyards of BritainHome to a veritable ‘Noah’s Ark of species’, thanks to never being ploughed, sprayed or fertilised, our churchyards offer a sacred haven for flora and fauna, says Laura Parker.
