A HISTORIC church tower’s £75,000 facelift has flown into trouble after bats were discovered in the belfry.

Builders were due to start work at All Saints Church in Great Holland next week. But when experts carried out checks on the 600-year-old tower, they found a colony of natterer’s bats.

Now work has been delayed because the species is protected.

The restoration project’s chairman, Judith Little, said: “The builders were all lined up to start.

“Then the bat man came along and found the bats. They are not to be disturbed because they are protected by law and we can’t do anything about it.

“We are all slightly peeved. I’d never seen any signs of life and was quite confident he would’'t find anything, so we were all a bit stunned.”

The church was demolished and rebuilt in the 1800s, but the original tower survived.

It is one of the oldest brick towers in Essex and has been a landmark for sailors for almost 600 years.

The church has raised £55,000 for to carry ou8t the restoration work to prevent it crumbling away. Wooden timbers are starting to rot because the roof is leaking.

But work will now be delayed until later this summer, when the bats have stopped breeding.

Mrs Little added: “The whole thing is going to give way unless we do something, so we need a new roof and to replace some masonry.

“But you can’t touch the bats when they are pregnant or when they are hibernating.

“There’s just a little window in August when we will be able to do the work.”

Renovations are expected to take three months, which means current rector, the Rev Peter Coley, won’t see the finished tower, as he is leaving in September.

Mrs Little said: “We thought the work would be done before he left, but now he’ll have gone before it’s completed, which is rather sad."

All 17 species of bat found in the UK are protected by law.

Natterer’s bats used to be called red-armed bats because of their pinkish limbs Their bodies are only two inches long, but they have a 1ft wingspan.

l Soprano Penney McEvoy and organist Chris Tutin are playing a tower fundraising concert at the church on April 30. It starts at 8pm.