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Most summers are calm, pleasant,

and very rural.  Not a lot happens

to amuse the cows,

but now & then ….

The young foxes normally hunt together, however, this one tried to go it alone. He caught a rabbit on one side of the fence but couldn’t carry it round. Instead he decided to pull it through the wire from the other side, a task which took 30 minutes

What strange creature is this ?

An unusual sight – bees sleeping outdoors day and night to escape the heat of the bedroom ceiling void !

There is always an excess of bunnies in the village.

In the winter they pretend to hide under black-currant bushes

In the summer they litter the lawns, else hide in the garage !

Peanuts attract Great Tits

Blue Tits

Long-tailed

Tits

And even

woodpeckers

This rat was just plain stupid.

So was this mouse

… and the Pygmy Shrews are not much brighter – they can get into a shower tray but can’t get out again.

Nature doesn’t always get it right.

This is a mutant Great Tit

that survived into adult-hood

Every so often a Stoat turns up to
play in the garden.

Hard work trying to photograph it

Even more exciting is a Buzzard struggling to overcome a Jackdaw, right under the window

Now for a  bit of
 light relief

– this is Otto,
a Polecat Ferret,
who lived in the garage

You can expect to see Roe Deer and Muntjacs all the year round in Ampney Crucis,  though the former have the knack of disappearing into the long grass for hours on end

Plenty of butterflies, of course,  from the spectacular,

and the unusual

to the indigenous