WILDLIFE experts in Worcestershire are hoping increased legal protection will help reverse the fortunes of the endangered water vole.

The creature beloved as Ratty in Kenneth Grahame's popular story The Wind in the Willows is rapidly disappearing from the county's river banks.

It now remains in only 10 out of 100 Worcestershire sites surveyed.

Until now, the water vole has only had partial protection under the Wildlife and Countryside Act, but it will be further protected as a result of new Government proposals covering 11 wildlife species.

"The water vole's habitat is currently listed, but the water vole itself is not. Our proposals will protect this rare animal from persecution and help prevent further population losses," said Nature Conservation Minister Ben Bradshaw.

Worcestershire Wildlife Trust hopes this will deter people from deliberate persecution of water voles and that councils, developers and landowners will act more responsibly towards them.

Most of the county's surviving water voles are in the Bromsgrove District, where the Trust is working with the district council to protect known populations.

"Full legal protection is great news for our surviving water voles," said the Trust's Water for Wildlife officer, Andy Graham.

"We hope this will help us to reverse the fortunes of the water vole in Worcestershire."

Water voles have rounded bodies about 20cm long, with blunt noses, chestnut-brown fur, short rounded ears and a long hair-covered tail. The largest member of the British vole family, they used to be a common sight crouching at the water's edge or swimming close to the banks. They can look similar to brown rats which also sometimes live near streams, and in fact are sometimes called, incorrectly, water rats.

Water vole habitats have been hit hard by river engineering, bank protection and maintenance works which don't take their needs into account, and pollution.

American minks which have been released into the wild have become predators of the vole.

Ratty from Wind in the Willows was actually a water vole.

Water voles are very short sighted. You could bring your face to within 30 cm of a vole's face, looking into its eyes and it would go on eating.

What can I do to help? Everything we buy or use has needed water to make it, which means the more items we buy rather than re-use the less water there is and the dirtier water becomes. Being sensible about our purchases can help. all water life enormously. And if you are taking dogs for a walk do not allow them to disturb habitats on stream and river banks.