CHILDREN from a Darlington school visited a nature reserve as part of their project to help save an endangered creature.

Children, and adult members of their families, from Harrowgate Hill Junior School are building nest boxes for harvest mice.

It is believed to be the first time such boxes have been built for the creatures, which have disappeared from most of the English countryside, but were reintroduced on Teesside last summer.

The box-building project, led by Harrowgate Hill school teacher Graham Temby, and Robin Laycock, a lecturer from Bishop Auckland College, will conclude with the boxes being moved to sites at Cowpen Bewley and Portrack Marsh, on Teesside, where mice are being released as part of a reintroduction programme.

As part of the initiative, the children and adults taking part in the school's Family Learning Project visited the two sites to survey the habitat which the mice enjoy and to learn more about their needs.

The scheme is supported by the Whitbread Action Earth Project, which is funded by Whitbread to help local communities support biodiversity in their areas through grants and other support.