No, not the title of a Beatrix Potter book, but the latest little wildlife drama to unfold in my back garden this very morning.
There I was, zipping up my work bag ready to go and catch the bus, when I saw a big gingery form slunk into my tiny back garden. I watched, motionless, as a Fox pottered along the path barely ten feet or so from me.
Oh, how I had had my camera to hand as normal, but no, on this one occasion I will have to try and describe everything through the power of words.
It sniffed up at the bird table, which is way too high for it to reach (my table is six feet tall because of the legions of cats that patrol the area) but then turned its attention to the pond.
I thought it was going to drink, but - no - it started scooping about in the waterweed with its paw.
It then hoiked a dangling stem of the waterweed out of the pond onto the slabs that line the edge of the pond and flicked it repeatedly with its snout before nibbling something up off the slab. Was it finding pond snails? It was impossible to tell.
To cut a long story short, ten minutes later, I'd missed my bus and the slabs were littered with a dozen pieces of waterweed that I'll need to clear up by torchlight this evening.
Have you seen a Fox do anything similar? Or have you had your own wildlife moment recently that kept you transfixed?
If you want to drop by my RSPB wildlife gardening blog, it is updated every Friday, and I'd love to see you there - www.rspb.org.uk/community/blogs/hfw
We have a nest of pigmy shrews near the house, because they need to feed so often, if you sit still for long enough you can watch them coming and going. Last week I was watching them when something larger caught my eye. From behind a wall a Stoat appeared, sniffed the air then darted behind a second wall where the Pigmy shrews come from. I later looked Stoats up to find out what they eat, this is where my excitement dimmed, Stoats eat small mammals. I know all about survival of the fittest but we have become quite attached to the little pigmy shrews.
Build it and they will come.
Hi Francis. nice anecdote, thanks. I seem to remember a photo of your frog-filled pond, no?
hi John. Thanks very much for what I believe these days is called a 'LOL moment!
I caught this one on the Norfolk Broads a while back [River Ant] it certainly had some sea legs
www.flickr.com/.../10800556825
http://www.flickr.com/photos/16304936@N06/
http://suffolk.activeboard.com/f528553/birds-of-suffolk/
My cat fishes out pond weed with his paw but not to get at the snails. He actually eats the weed in spite of being a well fed Bagpuss-shaped cat.
The pond does seem to be a bit of a larder. In March the mallard eat the frogspawn and in April the crows eat the newts. From May onwards birds eat the mayflies and damselflies as they hatch and in summer dragonflies hawk the myriad flies the pond seems to attract. In autumn birds munch the seed bearing plants around the pond and in winter I break the ice for whatever creatures are around.
You would think that pond dwellers don't stand a chance, what with everything eating them, yet every year, in late February/early March, the frogs return and the pond bursts into noisy life after its winter hibernation. And the cycle starts all over again!