EARLY ARRIVAL

I'd just been out to the kitchen when, as I came back to my armchair, I spotted the badger arriving early. Luckily I'd thrown out some bread but no peanuts - it was only 10 past 8. These photos are taken from indoors, as you can see, without a flash as the door was shut. When the badger first arrives it bobs and weaves its head, testing that everything is OK before it ventures a few steps then repeats the movements.

Everything was OK so it came closerand closer. He was being stalked by the kitten from next door... it's hard to make out but the kitten is the shaped white blob in the top r. hand corner. The badger grabbed a chunk of the (old) bread and trotted off down the path, preceded by the kitten, and back through the pop-hole. He didn't come back until after dark so perhaps the neighbour had scared it off as it would have seemed to be chasing the kitten. When he did he brought his sibling with him so at least the food was shared last night, peanuts included. On Sunday there were three, the last arriving much too late to benefit!

A VISIT BY BROCK

Yesterday evening, while it was still daylight, the badger came through the hole under the fence and sat on the path judging whether it was safe to come up to the house for his/her supper of peanuts and oddments of food.

It was about 8.15 and I hadn't put out the peanuts so I stepped out of the patio door and walked to the shed - and the badger lolloped down the path, round the bend and out of sight. When I went indoors I was able to leave the patio door open. Wrapping a quilt round my legs I sat and waited while I watched (by then) Have I got News for You. The noise of the TV, changes of light, laughter and music doesn't seem to bother them.

The blurred mark on the left is the edge of the patio door frame and the badger is about 4' away. Looking at their claws it's no wonder that when my neighbour filled in the previous 'pop-hole' they'd made, it didn't take long for another to be dug. Or that badger holes in my so-called little lawns are a problem for me.

I'd wondered whether flash photography would bother them but when it didn't I realised they are used to the outside light clicking in and out - a lucky result. I could see the second one, which I think is a sibling, sitting in the path - then one of the occupants in the next door house came out to smoke and talk on his mobile - and they both disappeared, claws clicking on the path. I hope that one day I'll get photos of both of them. It was lucky that I spotted the first one because it gave me a time frame to sit with the open door...

NIGHT TIME VISITOR

This is what my patches of lawn look like this morning after a badger has been visiting... Could be worse but if I catch my foot in one of the holes I'll lose my balance and you can never get all the soil back in the hole to make it level again.....

My next door neighbour is upset about the damage to his lawn and, unfortunately, blames me for encouraging them in as I put out food for them, but to be honest, they'll come anyway. There's not a lot you can do, as badgers climb as well as dig. I have a couple more photos, too, but won't put those on - the badger picture comes from a couple of years ago as I didn't take any good ones this year even though they were coming in the daylight. The most I've had in one visit is four and I think they must have been a family group with one scooting in and out of the shrubs, having a fine old game.

A hole under the fence between the neighbour (above) and me was blocked by next door but the badger just dug another one which exits under my hydrangea bush and the track they've made goes across another flower bed and under a hole under the 'other side' neighbour's fence. But they feed them, too, so I'm OK there.

Badgers eat all kinds of things but dig for worms - unfortunately also destroyinga bees nest in the ground a few years ago, taking two nights to clear it out completely... I leave out apple cores, jacket potato skins, peanuts, bread and peanut butter, porage oats rolled into a small ball with water, just enough to make it stick together and any bird seed disappears, too. And tulip bulbs...

I put up with the damage for the pleasure of seeing the black and white face (and the rest of it!) slowly and cautiously advancing up the path in the light from the security light, put up just for this purpose. And one came visiting in January this year when the snow was quite thick on the garden - I managed to photograph a footprint with the claw marks showing so knew what had been around.

They're part of our British wildlife and I'm pleased they choose to come into my garden.