The badgers have well-worn paths from the boundary fence right up to my door, where, if I sit still and quiet, they come within a couple of feet of me every night as they snuffle and gobble up a few fat balls and peanuts with amazingly loud ‘gronf, gronf’ sounds. I’m putting out food for them twice every evening, as members of each clan forage independently, and I was delighted to see them bring a pair of cubs along to what they’ve now become habituated to as a regular feeding spot. I am not entirely sure about this, but I think it is the boars who bring the cubs round, showing them the feeding spots while themselves standing back and watching the cubs eagerly hoover up all they can grab.
It’s quite comical to see them barge each other out of the way with their bums. They also park their bums on the ground while they eat, supporting themselves on their front legs and, although I don’t quite understand why I find this charming, it never fails to amuse me. I was surprised to see how busy and industrious they are in search of food. For some reason, I assumed they would be rather slow and lumbering, but they dash around on their stumpy legs at quite a pace.
Sadly, they don’t seem to have acquired any road sense and it’s rare to drive for more than a few miles without seeing a grey and black bloody corpse squashed in the road. Presumably, their poor eyesight and the high-beam lights of cars on unlit country roads are a lethal combination.
Foxes are a rarer sight, out here old Reynard has not forgotten or forgiven humans, (Fox Hunt Lane is nearby) and they carefully avoid us, making off if they spot us even a field away, unlike their urban cousins who seem to regard humans as just another part of the landscape. Rabbits too, dart away when we approach. Deer are bolder, and a hazard when driving along the lanes. More than once I’ve had a herd of does and fawns, or a stag, emerge suddenly from the hedgerows to cross the road ahead of me. The sadly reduced humble hedgehog is an occasional visitor whom I am not keen to encourage for fear that Mr Brock will eat him while earthworms are hard to find in the rock-hard dry earth.