Bats: survey or research level 2 licence (CL18)
Register for a licence to survey bats using your hand, artificial light, endoscopes and hand-held nets for scientific, research or educational purposes, including for commissioned surveys in relation to proposed developments.
Applies to England
Documents
Details
This licence allows you to disturb or capture bats by hand or using:
- endoscopes
- static hand-held nets
- torches
You can disturb but not handle hibernating bats.
You need a:
- level 1 licence if you only need to use a torch
- level 3 licence to use mist nets and acoustic lures
- level 4 licence to use harp traps
For survey, research or conservation work not covered by this licence you must apply for either:
For development work affecting bats, you must apply for a mitigation licence.
You must release all bats at the place where they were captured immediately after they are examined.
Register with Natural England
Before you can use this licence, you must register with Natural England using the registration form.
Natural England will confirm your registration in writing, usually within 30 working days. You must not carry out any licensed activities until you receive written confirmation of your registration.
What you need to pay
It costs £104 to register for a new CL18 licence.
It costs £35 a year to continue your registration.
You must declare the intended use of the licence on your registration form. To continue your registration, you must declare how you used the licence in the past year on your annual survey return. This will determine if you need to pay, such as to survey bats for development projects.
Natural England will refund unsuccessful applications.
When you do not need to pay
You do not need to pay if the licence is only used for:
- voluntary purposes – any work you do is unpaid and you are registered with an organisation, charity or local recording group as a volunteer
- conservation, science or research purposes and research related to the protected species is carried out by a student or employee of an academic institution or research body
How to pay
You can pay using a bank card. Follow the GOV.UK Pay link on the registration form or survey return form.
Read the terms and conditions for paying for a wildlife licence.
References
You need to complete a reference to support a survey or research licence form when you register for this licence if you:
- have not held a licence for the species or a similar species for the last 3 years
- have a licence but want to add new methods
Report action taken
You must complete the survey return form by 30 November each year, even if you’ve taken no action or did not find target species.
You should only complete and submit a survey return form between 1 and 30 November each year. If you need to submit it outside these dates (for exceptional reasons only) email wildlife.scicons@naturalengland.org.uk
You must report your actions from 1 November to 31 October each year. You must list all surveys carried out under this licence where you found bats. For each survey, you must record:
- the bat species found
- survey location – include the 10 figure Ordnance Survey grid reference, site name, county and postcode (where available)
- date of each survey
- visit type and roost type
- number of bats you observed or captured
- the purpose of your survey
You can also record additional information such as:
- the sex and age of bats found
- methods used for that survey
- notes on the survey site
You’ll also need to give:
- the names of accredited agents who worked under your licence
- whether you followed best practice when using the licence
You must also send your results to the Local Record Centre. You can do this by recording your results on the iRecord website or contacting the Local Record Centre.
Continue your registration
You can use the survey return form to continue your registration. It costs £35 a year to continue your registration, unless you are exempt.
Updates to this page
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Updated licence charge.
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Added a link to the updated 'Apply for a class licence to survey protected species' form.
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We are currently making improvements to our licensing forms. The register for a class licence form on this page will change to a new format in early March 2025. Once this happens, the current version of the form will no longer be available.
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Updated this licence to cover the period 1 January to 31 December 2025. Reworded several sections to make the information clearer, including the section on 'Registering to use this licence'.
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Added that 'If there is a difference between a licence condition and published guidelines, you must follow the licence condition'. Added links to the UK Bat Mitigation Guidelines and Bat Surveys for Professional Ecologists: Good Practice Guidelines (4th edition).
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Licence has been changed to state that reports of action taken must now be returned by 30 November each year.
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There is an update to this licence for 1 January 2024.
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Removed reference to harp traps and mist nets from licence definitions as these are not permitted techniques under CL18.
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Annual licence update, valid from 1 January 2023.
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Page updated: You should only complete and submit a survey return form between 1 and 30 June. If you need to submit it outside these dates (for exceptional reasons only) email wildlife.scicons@naturalengland.org.uk
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Removed 'hand nets' from the list under 'Licence terms and conditions' in the HTML attachment 'Bats: survey or research level 2 licence (CL18)'.
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Added a new online form - 'Submit a survey return and continue your registration'. From 1 June 2022, you will need to use this new online form to submit your survey return and continue your registration.
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Annual licence update, valid from 1 January 2022.
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From 1 October 2021, you will need to pay £80 to register for this licence, unless you're exempt.
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Annual licence update
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Accessible version added - HTML.
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Licence has been amended to state that reports of action taken must now be returned by 30 June each year.
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Reports of action taken must now be returned by 30 June each year (was 30 April).
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Replaced licence with new version issued 1 January 2020
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Replaced licence with new version issued 1 January 2019
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Replaced licence with new version issued 1 January 2018
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Annual licence update 2017.
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Replaced licence with new version issued 1 January 2016.
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new version of CL18 valid from 1 January to 31 December 2015.
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First published.