Pond Cam

pond
house sparrow
House sparrow

We haven’t recorded a fox at the end of the garden on the trail cam for weeks now so, as we’ve recently trimmed back around the pond and scooped out the duckweed, I’ve set up my Browning Strike Force Pro XD trail cam there. This morning at 10 it recorded a dunnock (above) followed a few minutes later by a house sparrow.

greenfinch

Ten minutes earlier this greenfinch had been down at the pond’s edge.

greenfinch

It looks as if it’s drying itself off after bathing but, if it had been, the camera didn’t catch it. I need to clear out the last of the duckweed to give the birds better access.

At eleven o’clock yesterday the inevitable wood pigeon waddled by and a squirrel bounded along, slightly blurred on the photograph.

With a closer camera angle and a bit of stage management of duckweed and pebbles, this could be the perfect spot for a back garden stake-out.

Fox Cam

Fox cam still

The last time we caught the fox on the trail cam was at 10.30, two nights ago, in the back garden.

sketches from last night's trail cam footage
Sketches from last night’s trail cam footage.

Last night it didn’t show but wood pigeon, magpie and Boris, a neighbour’s cat, triggered it between six and eight this morning.

fox scat and pigeon feathers

Apparently all the action was in our front garden. This morning a cluster of wood pigeon breast feathers and a pile of fox scats were all the evidence left by whatever drama took place under the rowan tree between dusk and dawn.

Browning Trail Camera

Trail cam

We’ve been leaving our new trail cam, the Browning Strike Force Pro XD, at the end of our garden, strapped to the compost bins.

Not much to report from last night apart from the usual dunnocks, house sparrows and a juvenile blackbrd.

fox

Rain seems to be enough to put off foxes from wandering around our garden, but we caught one on camera yesterday at quarter past four in the morning.

fox

What appears to be the same fox had wandered through a few hours earlier, at 11.30 p.m.

Trail Cam Fox

Testing my new Browning Strike Force Pro XD trail cam yesterday in the back garden: at night in infrared mode on red fox and in daylight on grey squirrel, juvenile blackbird and dunnocks.

We think there may be two foxes; the first, with a bushy tail appears at 10.13 p.m., then ten minutes later there’s a similar-looking fox crossing the screen and finally, at 10.26, a fox with an apparently thinner tail with a lighter tip to it appears to notice the infrared light and it heads off.

The following night we recorded no fox activity, so I hope that we haven’t put them off with the infrared.

Wood Pigeon Selfies

trail cam photo

Time to test my new trail cam by positioning it below the bird feeders and sprinkling a few crumbs and mealworms on the lawn.

wood pigeon photos
dunnock

The wood pigeon took 36 selfies and even photobombed the dunnock’s brief appearance.

Also captured on camera, a blackbird, house sparrow and what we think was a song thrush.

Next test is on the video setting through the night . . .

blackbird