BATS will be offered a new home when a barn conversion gets underway at Gerrards Farm, Venn Lane, Pilsdon.

The planning consent for the changes includes fitting a detached bat roost box for the protected creatures.

Dorset Council has given planning consent which includes the removal from the site of several redundant 'unsightly' modern farm buildings, some of which are semi-derelict using a stone built barn for a three-bed home.

An ecological assessment of the site found evidence of Common Pipistrelle bats foraging and using the site for a day roost with a Long Eared Bat also foraging in the area.

The agreed consent for the changes says that a bat box will have to be installed on the building, or on an adjacent building, prior to construction work starting with an ecologist having to be called in should further evidence of bats be found.

Upper Marshwood parish council supported the changes.