Last week I brought home the trail camera that had been on the ridge separating two pond areas. Lazily, I hadn't deleted the 600 odd files from the camera being placed in the cats' kitchen to see who might be stealing their food (a couple of visitors, but mainly they are greedy gut buckets), or the 300 or so files from 24 hours in the chicken run, checking for rodents (no rodents, but sparrows and a big, fat, cat that isn't one of ours). But lucky me, there were a further 600 odd files showing who spent time on the narrow paths that crossed just by where I posed the camera.
There were a few visitors I had expected - the ducks. They really are rather sweet!
I was a bit concerned to see that a boar had tried to go along the path, but it turned around and went back. Still, the photo was pretty worrying!
It should be no surprise that there were rodents. I got one short film of a rather cute mouse with huge ears, which is quite difficult to see. I got a lot of footage of what rats do when there aren't sewers and garbage bins around to rummage in. I actually find it rather good to see a wild rat a long way from human habitation, and I have no intention of doing anything to move them on. This is their natural environment after all. Here is a bit of rat activity for you.
The mouse was about a quarter of that size, so that is definitely rat. While this is definitely coypu! Fortunately it only passed the camera once during the two weeks the camera was in situ, so I'm hoping that means it doesn't live around there. If I spot it on another camera and a lot, then I will have to intervene. Coypu are an invasive, non-native species that cause habitat damage and have no natural predators. They are also rather ugly to my eye. You can see he is a lot bigger than the rat, but has a similar style tail, so cannot be confused with a beaver.
Deer passed through and a thrush looked for snails, but the real find at that location was a bird I had to get a chum to identify as my original thought was a partridge with a dodgy beak. It doesn't make much noise, so my Merlin bird identification app hadn't picked it up either. May I introduce my new best friend, the water rail? Elusive and rather scarce but seemingly happy to pass through the plot from time to time. It went backwards and forwards for three days, and was a privilege to see.
Otherwise, we have been working hard on the gardening front - I've been planting shallots and eyeing up the flower buds on the broad beans, which should come out soon. John has set up and planted the new asparagus bed, complete with commercial compost on the top to give it the best possible start. A good asparagus bed will last at least 10 years, while the corms we planted just before we moved (so back in 2003 or so) are still productive, or at least those that still survive are anyway.
Some of my favourite spring flowers - flag irises - are starting to come out. These purple ones are the earliest, but will be followed by the reddish ones and the deep purple and white as the weeks go by. As there is left over compost, I must also plant up the bag of freesias I bought a couple of weeks ago and then think about getting the onions in. For ages we were saying that spring was still a way off, but now it is here, and it is action stations!!
So I'd better stop writing about it all and get back to doing useful stuff! Have a good week!
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