A badger up a tree - almost

Somewhere in the misty recesses of my post holiday mind, I remember promising some new badger footage for your viewing pleasure. Now, I hope you haven't been holding your breath to see this as I know that I have taken a bit of a dawdle getting it on here. Never mind, badgers up trees in all their glory await you.

So tree climbing critters seem to be all the rage nowadays, what with the otters and the badgers, even squirrels are at it nowadays! Has all the never ending snow coupled with the prospect of being famous gone to their heads? I think its more a case of good old animal behaviour, pretty interesting none the less. Some weird animal behaviour for you to ponder ....

Robins in urban areas are now singing at night because it is too noisy during the day.

Or how about a chicken-eating cow in West Bengal. When 48 chickens went missing in a month (thats a lot of chickens for any animal, never mind a cow) from a remote West Bengal village, everyone blamed the neighborhood dogs. But the owner eventually solved the puzzle when he caught his cow gobbling up several of them at night. "We watched in horror as the calf, whom we had fondly named Lal, sneak to the coop and grab the little ones with the precision of a jungle cat." Local television pictures showed the cow grabbing and eating a chicken in seconds and a vet confirmed the case.

Or imagine sleeping on your heels like a baboon or do as some birds do and sleep with one eye open.

Its on the internet so it must be true .....

Yep, animals are pretty strange creatures with some weird and wonderful behaviour but I guess they probably think the same, if not worse, of us.

But now onto the means of capturing this wonderful wildlife. I have a new camera. 5 new cameras in fact. HD cameras. Prowler HD cameras. I've hit the big time. Sadly, I havent had time to try these cameras out (or even to buy batteries and memory cards for them) but I will. Today. As well as my excitement at having new cameras to set up (and thus new adventures to be had), a new WildPlaces Assistant, Paul, started on Monday so one has become two. Oh yeah. I now have faith that between the two of us we have the means to become a wildlife-on-film busting superpower.

I'm not sure who the fat bloke on the end is, but its not me, alright?! Just not to be done on copyright infringements, this wonderful portrait is courtesy (unbeknown to them) of ippiki.wordpress.com. SSsshhh, dont tell.

Hedge Planting and Otter Acrobatics

Well, well, well. There certainly have been many exciting going ons in WildPlaces land these last few weeks. I ventured back into the scary woodland, I got some otter acrobatics on film and I did a little bit of wildlife hedge planting at Moorside Allotments in Fenham.

First, lets talk practical work. The other week, WildPlaces and my super helpful team of volunteers were lucky enough to be joined by Trai Anfield from the BBC and some keen conservationists in the making from Byker Primary. The weather was absolutely freezing (surprise surprise) and at one point I think we all lost feeling in our feet but the job got done, we had a good time (well I did anyway!) and we hopefully saved some wildlife while we were at it. Or to be more precise, we enhanced the habitat and reduced fragmentation for future generations of wildlife. Grow little hedge. Grow with all your might.

Good times. Next up, I'm going all out on an entire week of conservation (aptly named Conservation Week) to take place at the Ouseburn Farm in Newcastle. Check out the website (www.urbanwildplaces.co.uk in case you forgot) and come along and help out if you fancy it. You may become famous like me and the gang at Moorside who were featured on Look North (if you can call 10 seconds a feature!) and in the Go Green supplement in The Chronicle. Check us out. Celebrities in the making.

So, next to the scary woodland. This time, I didnt get lost and I didnt get scared but I did get some cool badger footage. So as not to spoil you, you can see that footage in my next update. I can't have you lot expecting 3 lots of pictures/film in every post. Sorry.

But you can see my little acrobatic otter if you like. I set up my trusty stealth cams on the Derwenthaugh pontoon again but this time it was on the opposite side to where I normally site it. At last, the otter climbed up the ladder and I caught it on film. I have been pursuing this show of agility for ages and am very very happy that it is now in my possession. Maybe its not as exciting as it could be (no baton twirling or somersaults) but I do still think its pretty cute. Hope you do too.