[Gordon Steadman]

Good for you too I'm sure.

We have an old ride on that is well past its prime - like me - and so slow that the animals will also have plenty of time to move. Not that there are many around. We have three very efficient hunters who offer us regular presents. Mostly mice and rats with the occasional rabbit. Very few birds although the place is teeming with them.

We have a couple of families of Hoopoos in regular attendance and I'm always afraid for them as they are fearless and spend ages on the grass. Cats seem suitably nervous of that long beak though and so far just sit and look at them.

[JasonB]

It doesn't feel good for me when I'm doing it.

We've got a little killer too, but he only seems to bring back mice. He doesn't catch birds, and he's not interested in the frogs and toads, of which we have many due to the slimy green thing we call the pond.

[CMOTD]

We don't have a cat at the moment but fortunately none of our previous ones were hunters, too well fed and lazy. Mind you, keeping them in at night helps. The last resident only caught a single mouse in 20 years and I swear he mugged another cat for it.

What we do have is a newt slaughtering blackbird! Last summer she was eating 3 or 4 a day, swooping on the pond whenever they came up for air. Amazing to watch but she has decimated the population and I have only seen one newt in the pond so far this year when it should be full of them. They are also under attack, as are the frogs, from the grass snake that lives under the waterfall.

[Gordon Steadman]

The joys of country living. We have an above ground pool that we use for water storage. There is an old cess pit under the house that catches all the water from the roofs and we pump it up to the pool occasionally. There is a large population of tiny green frogs that live in the pool and its surrounds. Watching the cats trying to catch them provides hours of entertainment. I they do manage it, they soon let go with huge shaking of heads and snuffling. Not sure what the frogs exude but whatever it is the moggies don't like it.

[CMOTD]

Speaking of wildlife, we had hedgehog wars in their feeding station.

[Gordon Steadman]

Nasty itch it's got!

[JasonB]

Hedgehogs are wonderful little creatures, so well done to you for making an effort to halt their sad decline.

What's the set up, I mean how do you avoid encouraging rats? What do you feed them?

Also, how are you finding the night vision camera? I've been debating whether to get one myself.

[CMOTD]

We are not actually short of hedgehogs in our village and they can be seen wandering about in most areas late at night. I live in a small housing estate on the outskirts so we are fairly close to uncultivated countryside. Most of the people in our cul-de-sac have made small holes in their fences so they can wander the gardens at will. I have seen up to five in our garden at once and it is surprising how noisy they are.

The feeding station is a plastic storage box with a 5" hole cut into it for access. The local cats find it very difficult to get in although one or two have managed it. We also leave a bowl of water nearby. We mostly feed them dry cat food, I think the hedgehog food you can buy is just the same stuff with a different label and a premium price. We don't overdo it as it it is meant to supplement their diet, not make them reliant on it. We do increase it in early spring and late autumn when their preferred food is getting scarce. Don't believe all that stuff about them being the gardener's friend though, ours will happily chomp on their food and ignore the big fat slugs that get in the feeding station.

We also have a hedgehog nesting box in the garden which is occupied now and again and is used for hibernation most winters.
Never seen a rat anywhere near my garden, although we do have a small family of field mice which also eat the hedgehog food as do our blackbirds.

The wildlife camera is a mid range Ltl Acorn which I have had for years. Not cheap but good value, it has day and night vision, PIR activation and timer facility. It will take still photos, videos, a combination of both and also do time lapsed stills. Does what it says on the tin but loses some efficiency on really cold days. I am constantly surprised how busy our small garden is in the middle of the night.

[JasonB]

Good stuff Brian. Nice to hear that the Norfolk hedgehog crew are bucking the trend of declining population.

I've never seen more than one hedgehog at a time here. But we're surrounded by farmland, which is probably not that hospitable for a hedgehog.

[Gordon Steadman]

I sort of wonder sometimes why we bother going out to eat!

Lunch today was venison fillet in a pepper sauce and the first new potatoes of the year from the garden. Plus all fresh salads from the greenhouse. Flavour cannot be any better and the meat was cooked to perfection by....modesty prevents etc.....

If it wasn't for the bonoffee pie.............