A trail camera bonanza – wild boar and badger, deer and fox.

Hello and welcome to the latest blog from The Olivia Rose Diaries on March 15^th 2024.

In the early hours of the morning something was stirring in the woods above our home. Beneath the stark branches of the tree canopy the world was washed in shades of black and grey, but one of the shadows was on the move, a ghost following the faintest of trails, one that snaked its way past tree trunks and skirted round the dense undergrowth. The shadowy outline disappeared behind a pile of tangled fallen wood, re-appeared for a second and then was hidden once more. I wondered if my eyes were playing tricks, straining against the darkness, but suddenly he was there again. It was a fox, his eyes reflected like headlamps. He boldly held the gaze for a second and then he was gone.

He had been captured on our trail camera, which we had strapped to a tree on what we hoped, correctly as it turned out, to be a well frequented animal trail. We left it there for two weeks, long enough for the wildlife to get used to it and then extracted the SD card and plugged it into the laptop to see what we would find. There were 96 pictures on it, some of them taken up by Michael as he wrestled to get the card out of the slot, and others where whatever triggered the camera had long since gone by the time the shot was taken, but this time round we had a good selection and I have included some of them below.

I have always assumed that seeing animals in the heart of their wild spaces, particularly in the dark of night, to be the domain of the expert photographers and the wildlife documentary makers. However, trail cameras with an infra-red capacity for night time shots are surprisingly affordable, and to my mind a worthwhile expenditure for a device that holds the key to another world. I know it’s a wonderful thing to see animals from far-off places, tigers and elephants or even Madame Berthe’s Mouse Lemur (apparently the world’s smallest primate and incredibly cute, although sadly an endangered species) but, for my own part, I have found it far more satisfying to collect my own records of the rather less exotic, but no less thrilling, animals that share my corner of the world.

You can gain an insight into the character of a wild animal from the way that it reacts to something alien, like a trail camera, being introduced to its territory. Take the fox for example. (Please ignore the dates on the camera, Michael forgot to to re-set them so they are not accurate.)

From our first encounter with him, he lived up to his reputation for being smart, canny. He, or she, knew immediately that the camera was there, looking directly at it, ears pricked, intensely alert, and you could sense that he was deciding whether he should be concerned about this strange box attached to a tree. The night time shots are always captured in black and white, but we also saw him during daylight, his pelt a rich fox-red, his tail thick and bushy and a black-button nose below amber eyes.

The fox always kept his distance but not so the deer, who in the past have come so close to the camera that the whole screen was filled with their nostrils as they sniffed curiously at this intruder on their patch. On this occasion however we didn’t see much more than a rump passing by in the mist.

We mostly saw the rear end of the badger too as he plodded past in the darkness, but just once he turned and treated us to a head shot, that distinctive black stripe that transported me back into Wind in the Willows and the world of Mole, Badger and friends.

The wild boar is also a nocturnal creature and, like the badger, he showed no obvious interest or awareness of the camera. We’ve seen wild boar with our own eyes out in the fields occasionally and spotted one in our field only the once, at twilight, but each time they seem to be creatures with a purpose, with a destination in mind and they pay little obvious heed to what is around them. Certainly both the deer and fox often pause, heads up, ears swivelling, smelling and listening, ready to flee if necessary. The wild boar keeps moving doggedly on, and no-one gets in its way.

Most of our shots of the boar were of the side of his body as he passed by during the night, so close we could see the individual bristles of his coat, although a bit blurry, but we were fortunate enough to get one close-up in daylight hours. It was just his head but the detail was clear and we noted the texture of his snout. It reminded me of an elephant’s trunk, obviously a greatly foreshortened version, so strong and yet so sensitive.

A few of our medley of pictures were taken up by domestic animals, a pair of hunting dogs, tongues lolling, breathing hard from the chase, an unwelcome reminder that animals are not safe in these woods. As long as humans are around, they are not safe anywhere.

Knowing that these animals are in such close proximity evokes strong emotions in me. It gives me a sense of rightness, a conviction that this is how I am supposed to live, in close harmony with nature. Without fail it fills me with quiet delight to see the family group of deer, three adults and two young ones, who often browse in our field as twilight falls and a fearful despair and anger as I hear the hounds baying and gunshots down the valley when the hunters are out. As I lie in bed at night, on the cusp of sleep, I like to think that as my day ends, so the nocturnal creatures have the whole night ahead of them. And lastly, I am thankful, because I know how lucky I am to live in a place where these animals, although threatened, still roam freely.

And that is about it for now. Hope all is well with you all wherever you are and that maybe you are enjoying your own animal encounters.

See you soon.

MJ