University Mammal Challenge 2025

Over the last few months, the Swansea University Conservation and Ecology Society (SUCES) has been taking part in the Mammal Society’s University Mammal Challenge (UMAC). This is a national competition encouraging student groups to engage with, record, and celebrate their local mammals. Their aim was to increase survey efforts, raise awareness of local mammal species, and give Swansea students the chance to get involved with hands-on conservation.

From February to April, the society ran a total of five events, conducted around 60 surveys, made over 30 social media posts and started projects such as the ‘Campus Champion’ campaign and mammal photography competition. This was in addition to joining the Sustainability Team on three beach cleans to protect coastal wildlife and attending a talk by Natur Am Byth and the Wildlife Trusts, on current conservation work in and around Swansea.

They kicked things off in February during Go Green Week, where they promoted the UMAC, encouraged students to download the Mammal Mapper app and advertised our upcoming events. They also conducted their first few transect surveys through Singleton Campus which gave a fresh perspective on the local wildlife, from rat tracks to many, many grey squirrels!

SUCES really got stuck in during March, starting with a talk on marine conservation from the Love The Oceans charity and a wildlife walk using the Mammal Society’s field guides, to teach attendees how to identify mammals (or signs of them). Following this, they hosted a campus bat talk and walk led by the University’s Biodiversity Officer, Ben Sampson. Spotting several common and soprano pipistrelles and identifying a possible horseshoe species using the bat detectors!

They started April in second place on the leaderboard! But didn’t stop there, and held the last event, a mammal themed pub quiz and fundraiser for the Mammal Society.

One highlight of the challenge was working with the Sustainability Team to place Mostela boxes around Singleton Campus for the first time - having previously only been used at Bay Campus. This was especially rewarding since they helped build the boxes back in October, and reviewing the footage gave a new appreciation for the diversity of mammals thriving in our urban spaces.

And if this wasn’t enough, they also participated in the 12 weekly challenges set out by the Mammal Society Youth Team and even won a prize for our 3D printed otter models during Mammal Art week.

This campaign has demonstrated great initiative from the society, and has proven to be very popular. It was even topped off by an otter sighting on Singleton Campus!

If you want more info on our UMAC journey, check out @swansea_conservation on Instagram & @swansconservation on TikTok.