Author: Georgia Locock

Yesterday I collected my trail camera after having it set up at a school for a few nights. The school is situated in a rural location and it has a brilliant woodland area. When I collected my camera yesterday I discovered that I had filmed a fox, a rabbit and a squirrel which myself and a lady whom works at the school were extremely pleased with! There are signs of badgers around the woodland too. I’m hoping to get much more footage around the here in the future.

Here’s some of the footage I got.

For over the past year I have been setting my trail camera up at a nearby badgers sett and filming the badgers which live in that sett. In the past I’ve managed to film all sorts of different behavior such as playing, fighting, eating, sleeping and some quite amusing rolling about. I’ve also managed to capture different badgers that live in the sett and some cubs which I’ve been extremely pleased about!

Yesterday evening when I went to set my camera up I noticed something very worrying. Around the sett trees had been chopped down to the ground and right back. Before the badgers sett was very well hidden and now it’s very open and visible. A long with this some of the badger sett holes which went around the footpath have been filled in! I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw what had happened and immediately thought this can’t be right! Therefore I did some research and came to the conclusion it would be best to get in touch with my local Wildlife Crime Officer. After many attempts and being put on hold, for what seemed like forever, I eventually got the message across to one. I haven’t heard anything back yet but I’ve also contacted some local badger groups too and received some replies which are positive.

After seeing all this devastation I decided to set my camera up anyway and compared to most times I only managed to film, I think, two different badgers which I think were both cubs from this year even though I left lots and lots of food out. Most of the food was still there in the morning. Here’s a few videos that I managed to get. What’s also confusing is I’m used to collecting my camera and having about an hours worth of footage but this time I only got about 15 minutes worth.

 

Yesterday I went to the British Bird Fair which is in Oakham, Rutland. It is a three day event and has been happening for the past 26 years. I thoroughly enjoyed myself yesterday and I can honestly say it was one of the best days of my life!

I managed to meet lots of great people, get their autograph, have a chat with them and have my photo taken with them. There were also lots of brilliant exhibits to look around which were very interesting! It was also lovely to have a chat with people that I would normally speak to on social media programs like Facebook and Twitter.

Yesterday I also went to a few talks too which I found very enjoyable. These were talks by Lucy McRobert, Darren Woodhead and Chris Packham. It was a lot to cram into one day but I really enjoyed myself and here are some photos.

Darren Woodheads autograph and a sketch he did in my copy of his book

One thing I also did yesterday was meet a fellow young wildlife enthuiast and blogger, Findlay Wilde. Findlay does a whole manner of brilliant work and you can see more here on his wildlife blog, which includes his latest post about last Sundays Hen Harrier day –      http://wildeaboutbirds.blogspot.co.uk/      

 

Last Monday I set my camera up near the National Memorial Arboretum and managed to film an otter which I was extremely pleased with! To attract the otter I left out some sardines but the otter just seemed to turn it’s nose up at them! I have set my camera up since then and I did leave some sardines out again as I had forgotten to get some different fish. Unfortunately I didn’t film the otter this time but I did have a heron that stood in front of my camera and I managed to get about 20 minutes of footage which was off the heron fishing when the river water had risen.

Here’s some of the footage that I got!

This is how fast the water level rose in under two hours.

Here’s a rat I filmed too.