My Life Outside blog

Village Rats and Dippers

Last week we took the opportunity of another sunny evening to go looking for Grey Wagtails and Dippers along our local river. What I hadn’t expected to see was this Brown Rat scurrying into cover, an animal so big that on first impression I mistook it for a Grey Squirrel. Read more…

Stonechat at Sunset

Sunset with the Birds

As September marches on it’s now glaringly obvious that the days are getting shorter. We’ve already lost at least an hours daylight each evening and with it the sun has given up a lot of the strength which used to see dusk stretching on seemingly well into the night. At Read more…

Froghopper

Garden Pan-Species Listing?

Pan-species listing is certainly not a new phenomenon but it has gained a huge following in recent years as birders in particular branch out into other areas of wildlife. For those new to the term a pan-species list basically involves recording any species of animal, plant, fungi or protist seen Read more…

Hogging the Moonlight

Hard as it is to believe but I posted the first video of our garden Hedgehogs way back in May and since then they’ve become a regular fixture. Most of the time piles of black droppings have been their calling card but they have been spotted in the flesh on Read more…

Llanelli WWT

Double Dipped

Sod’s law and I have a very close working relationship. Most of the time this is nothing more than a minor irritant but when it comes to birds, well that’s a whole different matter. Chances are that if a rarity turns up in South Wales I’m likely to be at Read more…