We will look back at the past fortnight and what has been active at our wildlife hide. the weather has been changeable, but the lighter nights have meant for a variety of wildlife activity in the daylight.
Over on Speyside Wildlife’s Facebook page, we have been bringing you live footage from our local patches over the past three months. On a Sunday evening this month, I am broadcasting live Badgers that are coming to the hide. If you would like to tune in on a Sunday evening, head over to our social media and follow us for updates.
Young Blackbird
Red deer hind
With lighter evenings we, of course, have been seeing birds and other wildlife from the hide before the sunsets and this week the young Blackbirds and Great Spotted Woodpeckers have been learning to feed themselves. As shown on our live broadcast, a Red Deer hind was seen in the grassy paddock feeding for a couple of hours, usually. The Swifts continue to feed on moths and flies with Bats also using the tall trees to feed as the light begins to fade.
Pine Marten on night camera
Climbing Badger
We have been lucky to see Pine Marten on our remote night camera as well as a few early mornings Red Squirrels. The Badgers and the cubs have been become much more adventurous, enjoying the logs and branches to find food, climb and dig. One of the older cubs is using a hollowed-out log to chew on, perhaps using it for teething!
Mother Badger and cub
The nicest surprise this fortnight has been the appearance of one of the regular females who came in with a small cub one night. This cub is half the size of the mother and typical of a newly emerged cub from the sett. This would appear to have been born later than the other two around the end of April, which is still possible but quite unusual to see. It is lovely to know that there are more cubs in this clan of Badgers and hopefully it returns to watch it grow.
Keep up to date with the news from the hide, by following this blog and our Website for updates about becoming open for bookings soon.