During 2023, 30 different locations across the Elston Farm farming cluster were surveyed. Recording was undertaken on 94 different nights mainly between April and the end of October, amounting to a total of 199 nights of recording effort across sites. 

Sound recordings (wav files) were uploaded by farmers to the BTO Acoustic Pipeline, where a first automated analysis was carried out and provisional results returned. Recordings were then moved to deep glacial storage for later auditing. At the end of the survey season, a copy of the recordings was pulled back, and manual auditing of the results / recordings carried out. 

Overall, 79,375 recordings were collected which, following analyses and validation, were found to include 13,945 bat recordings, and 199 small terrestrial mammal recordings. Over 30,000 recordings of bush-crickets were also recorded as ‘by-catch’, for which we report species presence on a site and night basis. Following validation, the study confirmed the presence of 15 bat species, 2 small mammal species, and 4 species of bush-crickets. 

Through the project, we have a better understanding now of the status of all species of bats on the farms surveyed. The report includes a full species-by-species breakdown of spatial, seasonal, and through-the-night patterns of activity. In considering how the data can be exploited for maximising farm productivity and societal gain, we highlight that there remain substantial barriers to real world use of this technology at scale.