I'd love one of those cakes, it should be a Lamington but we don't have any here. Victor's seemed to get to know his way around today and has met a few new people who came over and he likes everybody. I'm glad he's got a good life again after being in someone's garage for a long time.

A typical British church in Finchley

I am having hell with Photobuck. Fingers crossed. The big shopping mall in Kowloon Tong had a visitor today. He must have been exhausted, visiting every shop, and the noise was incredible He is a very modern Lion.

Oooh, a very pink lion; looks like he's having a bit of a sitdown, I don't blame him.

I'm not fussed on photobucket either, Ren. On my app, for a couple days you couldn't even upload anything. Are there any other sites that do the same thing (with an easy learning curve)?

It's getting dry here and our tanks are near empty.

This little beastie is not supposed to be out and about at this time of year, he's supposed to be hibernating but the warm weather has clearly woken him up. Which is a problem, because when hedgehogs wake they lose over 30% of their bodyfat and need to eat but at present the worms, slugs and insects that form their main diet aren't around. So today I boiled an egg for him, put it outside at dusk and hey presto, one hog. Tomorrow, catfood.

Who knew hedgehogs eat eggs? You are a mine of useful information, Caroline!

It's a stop gap if you don't have anything else suitable. Hardboiled and finely chopped; the robins can eat his left overs in the morning, they like egg. This little guy has been busily eating the food I put out for the ground-feeding birds, like the blackbirds, thrushes, and robins - he seems particularly fond of sunflower seed hearts which are naturally amongst the most expensive birdfoods. Hedgehogs do eat catfood and dogfood but it's not all good for them so a selection of expensive chicken or turkey morsels in jelly is required. And dried cat/kitten food... but only the most expensive brands. Why can't I get wildlife that will eat anything? Still, hedgehogs are in such trouble it's a great rarity to be visited by one these days so I'll try to keep him going. I just hope he returns the favour by leaving his calling cards on next door's path, not mine!

Oh and they like dried banana too. Who knew?

I was listening to a podcast of an English radio show recently where they were talking about hedgehogs coming out early and what to do with them. Wish I could remember more detail but it looks like you've got it summed up!
When I was in Scotland 25 years ago they were everywhere .. are they diminishing all over or just your area, Flopsy?


I send a letter to Conor every week while he's away at school and like to do up the envelopes. This one got sent back to me so it looks like I've found the line that you can't cross with the Post Office!

If they had another entrance I could walk into my local garden centre in a few minutes but it's a long round trip.

Church of Our Lady before Tyn in Old Town Prague.

It's UK wide. A lot get killed every year on the roads - they have no sense of "two huge lights + tarmac = danger". But recent mild winters, with them waking half-nourished when there's no food followed by another cold snap haven't helped, nor has the surburban blight of nice tidy gardens with solid fences and no hedges... and in some places the terrible floods over the past few years have killed a lot more. My nice fence has two holes in it, at the base, just big enough for a hog to get through. I don't know where he's nesting (an adult hog will walk for about two miles every night) but two of my neighbours have a tangle of growth along the fence - those houses are rented so I imagine the landlords don't want to spend the money on sorting that out, which is probably good news for the hogs. Anyway, I plan to put a sign over the holes in my fence "hedgehog highway" and hope that whoever buys the house keeps it that way!

PS I tried telling my niece that I thought I had a hedgehog and had put food out for it - she was quite scathing and said that as I was feeding the birds it might be rats! I argued that no rat poo I'd ever seen (admittedly not a lot) looked liked a hedgehog's calling card (which is quite distinctive). When I put the phone down I went outside with my torch and there he was! So I rushed indoors for the camera and sent her that image. I called it "The Prickly Rat".

I would be delighted to post a photo or two, if I knew HOW!

Give me a chance to feed the hedgehog and then me (I know my place) and I'll send a note to your forum mailbox.

I haven't seen a hedgehog for a while here. Not so long ago so many were around there was a sign telling people to let them cross the road, which they frequently did. I don't think the massive increase in foxes is connected as I can't imagine they have many predators.

Trees near Ockley in Surrey.

After humans, the main killers of hedgehogs are badgers who relish hedgies as a tasty snack - so much so that hedgehog rescues won't release hogs into known badger areas. Sometimes nature just makes it hard to be outraged; if they don't get rid of hogs on the Scottish islands the ground-nesting birds lose their eggs/babies but if they do get rid of them there's an outcry, if badgers are culled because of TB we'd have fewer brocks but more hedgehogs, and so it goes on.

Meanwhile 'my' hedgehog is huge. I saw him last night drinking from the birds' waterdish and he was at least eight inches wide - I know this because he was sitting on top of a small retaining wall and he was as wide as the paving slab. Of course it is possible that was a different hog... if there are two (or more) I'm definitely going to be eaten out of house and home.

The entrance to Hokianga Harbour as seen from Opononi.

Ah, interesting. I've never seen a badger near me but a couple the other side of the river by Teddington Lock.

A country view near the last one.

Our pet sheep.
Well, they aren't really pets, I'm resisting giving them names, they're just here until it rains.

Awww,Jill. I do so love a lamb chop

My cousin makes incredibly messy, OTT Pavlovas, and there is always one waiting for me when I get there. I cannot think for the life of me how she got the idea that I would eat that.

I'll have some if it's going?

Here's the latest old sign which just turned up in Ware and used to apply to a quarry entrance which is now a golf course.

Marlborough coastline & island in the sunshine through a foggy plane window

I love the ripples in the outer water but not in bay(?).

This is Dusty who came for a walk with me yesterday. I was going to take him to a trough as the halfway point so he could have a drink and cool down but I could see there was a mob of stock there and didn't want to risk him chasing so we turned around a bit early ... which also meant I had to share my water.

The original entrance to the M1 motorway in Hendon, now the second after the newer one in Cricklewood.

I enjoyed learning all about hedgehogs (we don't have them Down Under)!


We are dog-sitting our "grand-puppy" this weekend as my daughter and her partner are away. This is Storm or Stormy, so-called because she leaves a path of destruction in her wake wherever she goes.

I have several proper birdfeeders in my garden, ones that dangle from hooks on the fence, some more lowslung - all positioned to suit the different ways birds feed. Including a ground feeding station (as it was called rather grandly on the box) in which I put all sorts of food meant to entice robins. Of course it also entices pigeons, magpies, and squirrels but they're all more scared of me than the robins are.

The thing about robins is that when you get everything set up to take their photo and wait patiently in the 'not as warm as it looks' winter sunshine they do a vanishing act so eventually you switch the camera off, turn round... and there's one polishing off the hedgehog's leftovers.