Making progress with SmallMammalCam

I rebuilt the small mammal box, putting on a larger perspex roof and lining the box with bark, this in the hope that the animals feel more secure and the pictures look more natural.  There is a single small side entrance about 45cm from the camera.  I have tried the box out in the garden and in the local nature reserve and in the first week it has been busy with bank voles, wood mice and common shrews, all of which are keen on free food and enjoy exploring.

Bank voles will often sit and eat in front of the camera.  This one was stocking up, cramming as much as it could into its cheek pouches.

Bank voles don't like sharing.  In the end the paler vole was the one to return and carry on feeding.

Wood mice are mainly nocturnal so they usually show up only in infrared videos.  They are hyperactive and spend most of their time exploring the box.  This one paused for a munch on a mealworm.

It can seem crowded if there are two in the box.

At other times they tolerate each other.

I can recognise several individual mice.  This one is small.

Another is large with notched ears.

This one is missing half an ear and has a lot of scars, presumably from fighting.

Here's another very scarred individual.  I wonder if this was from fighting or if it perhaps escaped from an owl.

This one has a permanently curled tail.

And this one has a short tail.

Common shrews are smaller than mice and voles and can squeeze through tiny spaces.  There wasn't supposed to be a gap there but the shrew found a way through.  It instantly changes shape from thin to round.

And another brief glimpse of a weasel.  The reaction time of the camera is around 0.4s and in that time the weasel has already come right down to this end of the box.  It was gone in a flash so I made the video in slow motion.  After the weasel had gone nothing else visited the box for over four hours, even though the food was still there.  I expect they could smell danger.