Wildlife
North 
Devon has always been
one of
the finest unspoilt locations in
the UK and is now home to B
ritain's
first new style world class UNESCO
Biosphere Reserve, where conservation and sustainable
development
go
hand in hand. That, coupled with the fact that Myrtleberry stands
in a Natural England Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), shows
that it's not just us who recognise the area as being a wildlife
lover's
paradise.
Regular visitors to the garden & river include dippers, wagtails, the resident heron, mallards, nuthatches, long-tailed tits flycatchers and pipistrelle bats which can often be seen flying round the Lodge in the late afternoon.
Red deer often come down at
night,
especially during
the autumn rutting season
when the stag's mating cry or "belving" is regularly heard.
Less regular visitors
that
have been seen include an otter, a
long-eared owl, sparrow hawks, a cormorant, a goosander
and even the
odd stray sheep.