After the badgers first appeared in the garden five weeks ago I several times checked the perimeter fences, looking to see how they got in. There were no holes so they must have been climbing over. Then just over a week ago a badger-sized hole appeared under the fence so of course I set up a camera to see who was using it. First up was the fox above. For several nights there was no badger, even though the other camera showed badgers in the garden. Then two nights ago there was a badger squeezing through.
The video shows who else has been using the tunnel. The good news is that so far there is no sign of a rabbit.
Trail cameras take serial pictures from a fixed viewpoint and lend themselves to making composites of images recorded at different times. These are particularly useful in showing relative sizes, as in the image above which comes from a couple of years ago.
The photo below is recent and is made from fitting together three slices of the same view with subjects that didn't overlap. It shows a comparison of the sizes of an otter, an American mink and a stoat, three distantly related species.
The next one compares the mink and the stoat on a different camera, the size difference somewhat exaggerated by the different distance from the camera.
In the examples above the joints between different photos have been removed for effect but I usually leave them to make the point that it is a composite and not a trick photo. The next three photos from the "weasel box" in my garden compare the sizes of a female stoat (L) with a female weasel in the first two and a male weasel in the third. They also show fairly dramatically the size difference between male and female weasels.
These also show female (L) and male (R) weasels on different visits to the box. The male is twice the weight of the female.
The last example compares male stoat (weighing 350g), female stoat (250g), male weasel (120g) and female weasel (60g).
I notice that all the animals above are mustelids, perhaps because they are frequent targets of my cameras but also because size comparisons of related species are particularly useful. I'll see if I can come up with something similar for smaller mammals.
Animals perceive the world very differently from the way we do. They have better vision, better hearing and a much more highly developed sense of smell. Mustelids in particular live in a world of scent, using it to advertise their presence and to see who else is about. The first video, from earlier this week, shows an otter sniffing almost every plank on the bridge to work out who has been there before.
Next a less welcome mustelid. A male mink scent-marking by body-rubbing, then a female sniffing to pick up scents, and finally the female doing a bit of body rubbing of her own.
A stoat has been a regular on some of the cameras. It was also sniffing its way around when it came across some mink scat.
Another video from earlier this week: a male weasel went through the camera box at high speed and on his return I am sure he was scent-marking in the tunnel. He was also making a weasel sound I haven't heard before. A couple of hours later a female weasel came sniffing through the box and picked up his scent.
Finally, to complete the local mustelid set, a couple of badger videos, although not recent. First a badger sniffing its way around and seeming to take a particular interest in my scent on the camera.
And a mother scent-marking one of her cubs to make sure it smells like the rest of the family. The cub wasn't impressed.
If like me you have a couple of dozen wood mice and voles in the freezer and have been wondering what to do with them, this may be the answer. Since the excitement of seeing ten stoats in the garden a few weeks ago the cameras have been picking up only one at a time, although not always the same individual. I noticed they have a particular liking for a space under a stack of large paving stones leaning against a sycamore at the end of the wall and were using it as a larder. On one occasion a stoat went off to fetch a chunk of something, either rabbit or squirrel, and took it into the larder. Three hours later it (or another stoat) returned and took the prize off elsewhere.
I had seen similar activity there as well so I put in a frozen vole and a couple of days later a stoat found it. It brought the vole out and then returned to see if there was another one. I think because stoats (and weasels) are used to raiding small mammal nests and bird nests they are always hopeful there will be more than one item of food. This time there wasn't so it took the vole back in and either ate it there or took it out the back door as it didn't reappear.
Expecting this might become a habit I put in a mouse but no stoat returned. Instead a magpie found the mouse and it certainly remembered and came back several times to see if I had left another one, which I hadn't.
Stoat sightings are intermittent at the moment but here's an example of what the cameras do see.
One of the cameras in the new wetland in Gosforth Nature Reserve is also seeing a stoat regularly although it is suspicious of the camera and doesn't hang around. It is only a mile away so it could be one of the recently dispersed youngsters from here.
This week has seen great excitement in my garden. I was away for a few days and on the first morning back I saw a stoat outside the front door and later one on the drive. There had been very little stoat action on the garden trail cameras while I was away but on Monday evening there were four stoat kits running up and down the drive so I knew something had changed. They were so fast and unpredictable that photographing them was difficult.
Later I saw more playing on a tree stump in the meadow.
After seeing the kits on the stump I set up an extra trail camera.
Here is a brief view of what they got up to on the wall.
Several times the cameras picked up a kit carrying food. The first one here has a vole which it doesn't want to share and the second is carrying what looks like a rabbit's head.
After only 48 hours they were gone but they saved the best till last. I had been wondering whether there were four or five but you can see on the next video there were ten! I presume this is mother and nine kits, assuming there weren't more out of view. A stoat family moving en masse like this is known as a caravan.
Here's another edit of the video with a slow motion replay to help count the stoats.
Jenny MacPherson's book Stoats, Weasels, Martens & Polecats says that a stoat litter usually has six to nine kits which are born in April or May and become independent at about 12 weeks. The book also says 10 stoats will eat about 0.5 kg of meat a day which translates into a lot of voles and rabbit heads so I expect this last video was the mother rounding them all up to move on because they had eaten all the food.
The cameras are still in place so I'll know if any of the stoats return. Although they didn't stay long I am just grateful they came while I was here to see them.
First a stoat I met while counting dragonflies at Hepple. I saw it running through the grass pursued by a crow, presumably hoping to steal any catch. The stoat then ran straight up an enormous ash tree and was searching for bird nests while being mobbed by anxious small birds. My camera was in static dragonfly mode (manual focus, single exposure, slow speed, low ISO, etc) and the only change I could make quickly was to autofocus but I managed a few photos.
In this photo the blur on the right is one of the birds mobbing the stoat.
The stoat didn't find a nest and eventually gave up and ran straight down the tree as agile and as confident as a squirrel.
The stoat in the garden has been frustrating, as stoats often are. I saw it by the gate with something in its mouth, possibly a kit, and it ran across into the meadow, towards the wall. I fetched a camera and stood waiting for half an hour in case it returned. Just as I gave up it came back with a second kit but I missed the photo. So I fetched a tripod and stood waiting for nearly an hour but it didn't reappear. It also didn't show on the cameras on the wall so I don't know where it went to. There are plenty of other log piles, stone piles and brash piles in the copse so it could be that there is a stoat nest in there somewhere.
The cameras can only see the front of the wall and the stoat does appear a few times a week. Mostly it just runs by but sometimes it does a dance. This is the most recent.
Another taste of what the stoat gets up to. It does seem to be aware of the cameras.
One time it pulled a rabbit out of the hat, almost literally. The rabbit isn't full grown and isn't very fresh and this was the only camera that saw it. You can hear a blackbird alarm in the background.
I live in hope that the stoat will keep the kits in the garden and that they may yet appear on the cameras.
The stoat has been having a bit of bother with the neighbours recently. A few weeks ago I posted a video of the stoat chasing a squirrel but sometimes it is the other way round. A male stoat could kill an adult squirrel but a stoat of either sex is more of a threat to the squirrel's young. Squirrels are nesting in the trees in the garden and I hope the stoat will nest in the wall so there is a very uneasy relationship at the moment.
I made a short video of some of the action on the trail cameras. A lot is off camera and the views were a bit distant so the images are cropped with some loss of quality but you get the idea.
The stoat (I am assuming it is always the same one) shows up on the cameras regularly and I have had two very close sightings in the past week. The first was through the window for a few seconds from about a metre away when it climbed up through a hedge. The second about 10m from the front door was bit longer as it probably felt safer at that distance. It seems to cope with me being around but I just hope the conflict with the squirrels doesn't put it off. Here's brief video of the stoat with what looks like a field vole.
Weasels are still around in the garden but they are too small and too sensible to get involved with the squirrels. Most times I see them dashing through the camera box but this one came out to play on the wall while the stoat and the squirrels weren't looking.
I rarely see a stoat or a weasel in the garden but I now have three trail cameras set up to look out for them, one on my "weasel wall", one in a camera box and a third watching the base of a dead sycamore and adjacent low wall. Since the start of the year stoat visits have been regular but fleeting, enough to show there is one around but not enough to suggest it lives here. It doesn't go into the camera box but appears on the other two cameras. Last week it briefly checked the base of the dead sycamore and then ran up the tree, disappearing from view - something I have seen several times before. This time, however, it came back down after only 15 seconds carrying prey, identifiable as a vole in slow motion. There is an old starling nest hole about 3m up the tree which is probably where the vole was, but why and how it got there, and how the stoat knew, is mystery to me.
Not to be outdone a weasel appeared on the same camera, checking on a delivery van before running towards the camera.
Most of the stoat recordings are on the wall. Here is one doing what stoats do, although quite why is another mystery.
Although weasel visits are less common, one also showed up on the wall last week, not quite as frantic as the stoat.
My hope is that one of these will decide that the wall is a good place to make a nest and raise young.
Mustelids seem to be taking over the blog and this week there is more news of stoats in the garden. After all the excitement in October and November it went a bit quiet and almost all my cameras were watching otters, polecats and weasels elsewhere. The Camtraptions camera wasn't contributing much so I brought it home and set it to watch the weasel wall. And straightaway there were stoats. The videos from this camera aren't great and this is cropped as well so it's rather grainy but you can see what is going on. The two clips in this video were only a minute apart but I am pretty sure there were two stoats - larger and smaller so male and female. The second one is a bit farther away from the camera so it is difficult to be sure but see what you think.
Then the female went through the camera box a few metres away. I have edited it at half speed to give a better look as she rushed through.
A few days later a stoat went through so fast that there was only a glimpse of its tail on the first frame. However the tail is longer than the female's tail (she's on the left here) so again I think there is also a male around although I don't yet have a video of two together.
I brought a Browning camera back here to get better pictures and over the past week there have been stoat videos every day, up to 10 in a day. Most of the activity is on the wall but also under the dead sycamore where I first saw a stoat last October. I think there has occasionally been a larger (∴ male) stoat but it is mostly a female. It is also encouraging that the female is defending the wall against squirrels, as in this video. She must like it here.
Then I moved the camera a bit closer and you'll see that the stoat knows it is being watched. Notice also that it looks rather pale so although we aren't far enough north to expect a full ermine I wonder if this is a partial winter coat.
Two years ago I did get video of male and female stoats only 10 minutes apart and that female had white legs and a white tail. I'll see if I can spare another one or two otter cameras to keep an eye on the stoats. I'll post more news when I have it.
2025 has been the best year yet for my trail cameras. The number of cameras has increased and I am learning how and where to set them up. The "weasel box" in the garden is a permanent fixture and is the best way of monitoring who's around.
After all the weasel excitement here in 2024 this year has been a bit quieter. The highlight was seeing a mother carrying her kits past the gate, moving from one nest to another. I have sneaking suspicion she might have been in my weasel wall and was unsettled by a stoat that was hanging around.
I remodelled the interior of the box just over a year ago with some old terracotta land drains to make it more interesting (for us and the weasels). This male was new to the box and having a good look round.
I tried baiting the pipes with a dead mouse in the hope of seeing the weasels regularly but it hasn't been a great success. The first time I put the mouse in the top pipe and the weasel could smell it but couldn't find it.
Next time I put a mouse in a bottom pipe and a male did find it but it didn't return for another one so for the time being I have given up.
Stoats haven't been as regular visitors to the garden as weasels over the years but I saw a lot of one female in late summer and autumn. The first sighting was near the gate.
Soon after this one visited the weasel box, something stoats are generally reluctant to do. (This also gave me the opportunity of making the composite photo at the top of this post to compare the sizes of female stoat and female weasel.)
Then in October I was lucky enough to see a female stoat (perhaps the same one) watching me from the base of a dead tree not far from my front door.
That was the cue to set up a camera and the stoat stayed around for a few weeks.
In the last month or two it has all gone quiet, with only an occasional sighting of a weasel in the box but I hope for more activity next year.
