The Church
St Mary stands in a watery landscape next to an orchard by the River Ouse. Green stained glass casts light on row upon row of carved benches, featuring lively little wooden saints and figures in amazingly detailed dress. The font cover, too, is a fine piece of carving, dating from the Jacobean period.
Saints also feature in brilliant coloured panels on the medieval screen, and there are some wonderful lifesize marbles of local nobles. In the south chapel, a brass the shape of a heart commemorates Sir Robert Kervile who died abroad. His grieving wife sent a monk to retrieve his heart, and it lies buried here. There is a lovely sundial over the porch entrance.
The church is now in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust and a keyholder is nearby for visitors.
Our Work
St Mary is home to at least five different species of bat, Common and Soprano Pipistrelle, Brown Long-eared, Natterer's and Serotine.
In summer 2019 the project commissioned a full survey of the church. This showed that the church was used as a 'transitional roost- where bats roost after giving birth and before going in to hibernation.
The bats were mostly entering through the north door and roosting behind the wall posts in the nave. They have caused a significant amount of mess throughout the church that the small number of church volunteers were struggling to clean up.
The project, working with ecologist Phil Parker has now installed a pole mounted bat box in the churchyard and a number of other boxes on churchyard trees. These are already being used by pipistrelles and this will hopefully reduce the pressure on the roosts inside the church.
In autumn 2023 the church also hosted a community cleaning workshop which was very well attended. This was followed by a fundraising bat night and will hopefully bring some new volunteers to the church.
Wiggenhall Case Study Poster
Wiggenhall Fact Sheet
Wiggenhall Bat Management Plan
Upcoming events
If you’d like to contact or find out more about the church, visit their page on the Churches Conservation Trust website