Compost-cam reveals more critters in the woods.

"You should put that trailcam on our compost heap in the woods. Something is definitely visiting it and throwing corn cobs about." Well I like a challenge so in darkness three of us walked out to the in-laws compost heap using a flashlight. I strapped the trailcam to the cage that is meant to keep the animals out, we threw our dead corn cobs on the heap and we left the scene. By the recordings we found later just 30 minutes after we set up the camera a raccoon came to check out the corn. To be fair the only animal this fence could keep out is probably a deer. Everything else, as we discovered, can easily get in there and have a good old root about.

I wasn't expecting a domestic cat in the line-up of compost eaters but there he is - one of the earliest visitors. Maybe his owner brings him in during the night and so he does his scavenging before midnight. Meanwhile just two minutes before the witching hour comes the skunk - the first time we've ever caught him on any camera. We got lots of shots of his rear end and I was a little worried he was going to spray the camera, making the card removal a little difficult, but he was happy and just wandered off.

The raccoon visited just after 2am and then again three hours later. This is an animal I've never seen in daylight here so I'm quite pleased to get lots of pictures of him.

 We weren't expecting a mouse either but the close-up shots showed he turned up just 30 minutes after the raccoon.

Our final visitor is the bluejay - beautiful bird, terrible squawk as any cottage dweller knows. 

Here is compost-cat eyeing up the vegetables in daylight. 

In other news we have had a baby nuthatch bobbing about on our parking apron in the woods for several days. We named him Bob as a result and realised he could not fly. He seemd to have been separated from his parents. We never really expected to see him more than once but every day he was still there on the gravel, searching for food. I took some seed down for him and then one day he was gone. We assumed he'd been eaten by something and were sad for Bob. Then tonight there he was on the gravel, we approached and he bobbed a bit and then flew onto a branch. It made my day. Here's Bob in his pre-flying days.

Following the success of the woods-cam and compost-cam I'm planning a lake-cam to see if we can catch the mink who often runs over the beach and possibly the raccoon who comes down to the water to do something unspeakable on a rock then washes his rear-end in the water. I can hardly wait.