My Top 5 Favourite Squirrel Photos/Videos

 In today's post, we will go through my favourite photos of one of the most majestic animals we have on the blog - squirrels. You can probably understand why I am picking the squirrel to do this post about; they are one of the rarest and most elusive animals we have had the opportunity to record - our cameras allow a glimpse into their secretive lives. Let's see what photos I have picked to represent this stunning icon of the wilderness.

5. A Good Quality Photo

It was an absolute privilege to be able to capture these photos of the enhancing squirrel. The quality is quite something.

4. Close Up of a Majestic Animal

Whilst having the camera trap out for the post 'Soggy Badger', we got a much more thrilling creature than what the title gives away. You guessed it, it was a lucky glimpse of a squirrel. Even better, it came right up to the camera! Unfortunately, it did knock the camera over meaning that we got no more squirrels that week.

3. Squirrel Action Shot 

There is no question in why I picked this photo of our friend, the squirrel. It truly emphasises why squirrels are so hard to get even just a glimpse of. Thanks to their  superb climbing skills and their ability to jump around branches, they can keep a watchful eye on us, even if we can't see them.

2. Night Squirrel

Maybe another reason that the stunning squirrel stays elusive is the fact that it often comes out at night.

1. Squirrels and Jays

Often, I put seed out to entice the remarkable animals to the camera. However, sometimes they are joined by a much less remarkable bird, the jay. I have had many videos of these fascinating interactions so here is just one, holding the number one spot.

They were my top 5 favourite pieces of footage of these enhancing animals. Who knows, maybe one day we will get some more priceless footage. 

Remember to leave a comment and happy April Fools Day!

A Lone Fox

 We tried a new location ( a few miles away from where we usually put it) this time and put some fox and badger food out. I got the food for my birthday and will use it in the future near the badger burrow as well. This is what the location looked like in the day.

We also got a mystery creature which I am guessing is either a fox or a late-night squirrel. 

Finally, we got a fox. I noticed how the fox's fur was slightly darker than most of the foxes we get in the usual spot. This shows the genetic difference that different places have; the foxes are lighter in one place than they are in another. Either that or it could be a bit muddy.

That is all for today's post. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

Courting Cormarants and Gifting Grebes

 A few weeks ago we went back to the lake where we often see herons, cormarants and grebes. The first thing we saw was a wild rabbit. It was near its burrow which was on the edge of a railway. 

We also saw the usual tufted ducks and geese. 

After that we saw a mating pair of grebes. When grebes mat they will give each other a gift, usually a piece of weed or sometimes even plastic.

Like the last time at the lake, we saw a cormarant perched on the same branch. Click here to see the last time we got saw a cormarant on the lake. 

After walking around the lake again we saw another cormarant perched with the first one. One of them had a bit of white around their head, indicating it is ready to breed.

That is all for today's post. That wasn't everything we saw at the lake so a second part of this post is coming soon. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

BADGER FIGHT!!!

 I guess February is a very good time of year to get great blog footage as this time last year we got a deer and a tawny owl in the same week. Im quite glad that February is the month for this type of footage as my birthday is just towards the end. This year my camera trap birthday present was rather different from last time - this time it was a terrible badger fight. 

Seeing as winter in the normal spot hasn't been great this year, I have been putting the camera trap out near the badger set. Using the tripod I wedged it deep into the soil, (and it was a good job I did)  therefore making sure no badgers knocked it down into the valley - remember, the badger sets are on the side of a valley, with a little river at the bottom. I put some seed out hoping to bring out the badgers but it attracted a rather big number of mice. Even in our first badger video, you can see a mouse hopping about in the background. 

The dates and times are also still wrong (I forgot to change them again) so ignore them.

I can't show all the mouse videos so here is my favourite one. Badgers aren't the only animals you'll see having a fight today...

We got another badger strolling along that night as well, this one was a bit muddy and bared its teeth in a nasty snarl.

The next badger slightly changed the angle of the camera, pointing it more up the slope. However, it was a good job it did as we will see later.

Here are some more badger photos:

Thanks to the other badger's camera skills, you got a better view of this one walking up the slope.

The next badger video was the one you've all been waiting for - the badger fight. You might be wondering why they are fighting. Badgers can breed at any time of year and the females will delay the pregnancy so that the cubs are born in February - pretty cool. Male badgers (also known as boars) will kill badger cubs that aren't their own so I think that one of the badgers in this video is a male, trying to get in to kill the cubs. However, the female badger mother (the sow) will defend the cubs at all costs. You can hear the horrible noise of the fight even after the badgers have knocked the camera over and gone offscreen, tumbling down the valley. The sound would have echoed around the whole wood. 

It is a reminder that the badgers which often come across as docile and calm on the camera trap are not to be messed with. Both badgers probably gained a few injuries but thankfully the mother badger scared away the attacker for good. However, when you get a video like the next one, they can easily come across as comical.

Unfortunately, the badger fight knocked the camera over, (that's why the tripod was important to make sure it didn't go down the hill) so we didn't get much else. As a result, that's the end of today's post. Remember to leave a comment on your opinion of the fight, the aftermath and what happened to both badgers. Thanks for reading!

Searching for Pheasants & Some Other Nice Surprises

 The other day I went searching for pheasants in the Churnet Valley. On the drive there I saw plenty in the fields nearby. However, when we got there it wasn't pheasants we saw first. There were multiple treecreepers (we got our first one on the camera trap the other day) creeping all around us.

There was even one clinging on very close to a robin.

It was shortly after that when we got a glimpse of a pheasant, quite far away in a field. Sadly it was too far for a good photo - and it was the only pheasant we saw.

However, what we saw next made up for the not-so-good photo. It was a pair of goosanders, and the first ever male one I had seen. The male is the one with the green head and the female is the one with the brown head.

That is all for today's post. Stay tuned for more birds, badgers and other beasts. Do you have any idea about what animal we should go searching for next?  If so, leave a comment with the animal you would like. Thanks for reading!

Searching for Egrets & Herons from Above

 In the last post, I mentioned that there would be another post coming soon. That is what will be in today's post.

We heard from a few local people that some cattle egrets had been spotted in our area. The next morning we were up and off in search of where they had last been spotted. We walked down a few country lanes but the best thing that we saw was a pheasant. We also somehow mistook a white plastic bottle for them as well. Eventually, we gave in and tried somewhere else to film some normal herons (coming later in the post). However in a field (the same one in which we saw the Egyptian goose) next to the road were the egrets, their white plumage standing out against the green grass. We must have accidentally startled them as they all soon took off. Then a pair of them landed on the other side of the field. They were quite far away so the photos aren't very clear. However, once looking back at the photos I realized that they aren't cattle egrets - they are little egrets. The local people must have mistaken them. The nice thing about these egret photos is that they are close to home, unlike the other ones we took in Italy. 

We were quite pleased that we had managed to track down our local (and rare) egrets. After that, we went somewhere else nearby to film some more footage with our latest piece of tech - a drone. I got a drone for Christmas but haven't filmed any wildlife on it - until now. Once we were set up we sent the drone over a pool. Roosting in the trees on the side were multiple grey herons - my favorite bird. The first one we saw on it was in the reeds. Maybe it was fishing? Before I put the photos on I want to make it clear that all these photos were taken from a good distance. That way the herons aren't disturbed. if you ever want to take drone footage of wildlife it is important to zoom in on it like I have - even if the photos come out a bit blurry.

After we saw that heron, we quickly moved on and saw many more in the trees. Some of them may be nest they are getting ready for spring. 

I'm excited to see what footage the drone could produce in the future!

That is all for today's post. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

4 New Animals

 I was originally going to name this post '3 new animals' but after today's outing, it is going to have to be 4. Every animal in this post is new to the blog so they are quite exciting. The first dates and times are still wrong on the camera trap - I forgot to change them.

Sheep

The most boring animal on today's post are sheep. We have had cows before but never this animal.

Treecreeper

The most exciting animal we got on the camera trap was a treecreeper. After a few seconds, it flies in and - as its name suggests - creeps up the tree. It is always nice when we get a new bird on the camera trap.

Grey Wagtail

Sadly, that was all we got on the camera trap. Anyway, while on our way home we saw a grey wagtail hopping along the canal. The light was starting to fade so the photos are a bit blurry.

Egyptian Goose

 Today, we were searching for another rare bird (coming tomorrow in another post) and thought we wouldn't see any after a while. However, after a while, we did see them. Once those birds had flown away I noticed something about the geese (which I thought were some early greylag geese). I noticed that they were a whole different species - one I had never seen before. They were Egyptian geese. 

That is all for today's post. Like I said earlier, stay tuned for another post coming tomorrow at 10:am where I go in search of another rare bird. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!