Water voles are the UK's fastest declining mammal, having disappeared from 94% of sites where they were recorded in the 1970s. Their welfare and conservation depend on habitat management and mink control.
Water vole welfare is inseparable from their conservation status: individual predation by mink causes traumatic death, while habitat loss and fragmentation creates chronic stress through increased predation pressure, reduced food availability, and social disruption. Mink are highly effective predators that can pursue water voles into burrow systems where their primary refuge is unavailable, creating an extreme predation pressure that most prey species never experience from introduced predators. Conservation mink control, which requires trapping and lethal removal, creates a welfare tension between the welfare of invasive mink and the aggregate welfare benefit to water vole populations. Where water vole populations are reintroduced or recovering, intensive mink control is required to give the programme any chance of success. Habitat management that provides dense bankside vegetation reduces predation vulnerability by providing concealment and escape cover.