[Closed] wildlife you are meant to dislike but don't.

We have red and grey squirrels in the garden. Both are kind of charming in their own ways. They have quite different ways of travelling through the trees and feeding. Both good to watch.

One of the most difficult questions I've had to answer from the kids ever is why do we like the red ones but not the grey ones.

Urban foxes are considered a pest by some. Had a flat with a fox den in the back garden, absolute joy to watch and the kits. The occasional terrifying nightime scream a bit of an issue.

You sure it wasn't an escaped pet ferret? I saw a family of 4 of them running down the Chester greenway a couple of years ago.

tthew it may have been a ferret but it was big and had very dark brown fur (I did check pics of mink when I got back and it def looked like one to me). The bridge I was cycling was going over a canal and pretty sure the mink/ferret lived around there.

Oh, I just looked them up, I really thought they were smaller than the quoted 35 to 45 cm! Where abouts raceface?

Seagulls, got to admire their intelligence.

Spiders, I wouldn't pick on one up but I normally let them stay so they can keep the flies down if they keep themselves tucked away (we had one living behind a mirror for months), but the big monsters and ones that crawl across your pillow get booted out.

Wasps, the ones some folk refer to as yellow jackets, o think they're pretty epic.

Magpies, my missus hates them, I love their colouring and general look, I also think they look kinda prehistoric, almost archaeopteryx like.

Until I get bitten, clegs / horse flies have pretty mad eyes.

In general though I like all wildlife, it all has its place, apart from midges, they can do one.

tthew it was about 3 miles from bath city centre.

i cycled a new route for once to bath (via box and batheaston road).

i joined up the cycleway and was going over this bridge near the cycleway sign.

apologies for not being more specific but my sense of direction is rubbish lol.

Yeah mink get everywhere, particularly near water. We had evidence near my mum (dead hares and other wildlife) who lives at 300 m elevation near to Llandegla. OP you want to keep your eye out for otters too, on the Avon they are quite regularly photoed around Saltford.

As for the topic, yep wasps, spiders, all have their place in the ecosystem and actually really interesting to watch. And yes invasive species are still special /cute even if it's our fault for introducing them that they have out competed some of our native species. You could include wild boar. Are we 'supposed' to dislike predators? Cos I do love our urban foxes and badgers and birds of prey, loved seeing a hen harrier a few years ago and yet so sad that they only a rarity because other people are killing them off.

People seem to dislike any animals that manage to adapt to survive and thrive around us - I'm thinking of pigeons, rats, gulls, urban foxes etc etc.

We much prefer stuff that shuffles quietly off towards extinction such as hedgehogs and red squirrels!

Pidgeons

Even in London I think they are great, fabulous that the Rock Dove has evolved to nest on buildings instead of cliffs & made such a success of it.

Midges

Rabbits, foxes and grey squirrels. Just really enjoy watching them. Pigeons are comical to watch and just make me smile

Maggots...!!!

What's not to like about their wriggly squigglyness? They do an important job as they tidy up the environment, fisherfolk love them as bait and lots of wildlife enjoy a delicious maggoty dinner.

I'm not keen on flies though.

Wasps, the ones some folk refer to as yellow jackets, o think they’re pretty epic.

On a hot summers day in my garden you can here a gently ticking sound. It's wasps stripping the wood fibres off my chestnut fencing. I love wasps their sting us a right bastard but nowhere near as much bother as running away from them constantly so they get to walk all over me.

I think magpies are beautiful, but I didn't think the same as one tried to extract the baby blue tits from their nest in our garden last month. Had to create a magpie deterrent (few screws through a bit of 1x4 on top of the nesting box. The bluetits seemed relieved!

Maggots…!!!

What’s not to like about their wriggly squigglyness?

Disco Rice

Spiders, I wouldn’t pick on one up but I normally let them stay so they can keep the flies down if they keep themselves tucked away (we had one living behind a mirror for months), but the big monsters and ones that crawl across your pillow get booted out.

you need to cultivate a little community of Cellar Spiders - great little low maintenance / low fuss spiders to have around the house - barely visible they're so slender, don't go scurrying about- just seem to float motionless in the corners of the room, a particular USP is they can get themselves out of a bath - and those annoying scurrying  big monsters... the delicate little gossamer Cellar Spiders will happily kill and eat them.

I've been carefully training my kids not to fear spiders and not kill them on sight. They now name each one they find in the house and treat them as some kind of pet whilst leaving them alone. Result !

Going off on an arachnid tangent - Zebra spiders are always welcome.

Zebra / jumping spiders are pretty cool. Only a fewmm long but are wee characters

One of the most difficult questions I’ve had to answer from the kids ever is why do we like the red ones but not the grey ones.

Surely, compared to many questions kids ask that was quite straightforward? I don’t hate Grey squirrels (we had some regular visitors to the garden which amused me but next door bought a cat and now we don’t). But I could happily explain to any child why grey squirrels are a problem in areas with reds (I hope you reported them - it’s not just “your own” red squirrels that are in danger, but all the ones they mix with).

In terms of the OP’s question - mink are beautiful animals - in their own eco system. Here they are viscous little things which will destroy birds and other small mammals and have no natural predators so will thrive until they’ve wiped out the local food source when they will move on to the next area. They are the vikings of the U.K. small mammal population.

Here they are viscous little things which will destroy birds and other small mammals and have no natural predators so will thrive until they’ve wiped out the local food source when they will move on to the next area. They are the vikings of the U.K. small mammal population.

The return of otters to water courses apparently helps against mink.

 

Tapeworms..
As long as they aren't mine.

We have a resident zebra spider on the living room window, see it out checking it's traps every so often.

I have a soft spot for the big buggers that stomp about like they own the place though. I remember picking one up once and actually felt it try to bite me, top marks for trying!

I'm getting better with wasps, not mad keen on them but after the huge ones in Germany a couple of years ago I'm a lot more relaxed, especially knowing how to distract them.

a particular USP is they can get themselves out of a bath

I’ve had to rehome three spiders this week. Stop setting up shop in the bath you idiots. One of them was moved to the back door and they seem to have hung around a built a web. Result! Flying thing deterrent in place

especially knowing how to distract them.

Is it with a song and dance routine?

I didn't realise I was meant to dislike stuff ? who writes these rules ? is there Daily Fail like wing of National Geographic running stories about rats stealing your jobs or something ?

I did see a spider yesterday running off with what looked suspiciously like my blu-tack, ooooo do I not like that !

Bats. They are mammals, fascinating, hoover up midges and sort of cute, but for some reason they are generally depicted as scary / evil / harbingers of doom.

It's a constant war of education for pro-bat groups to contradict the TV/movie depiction. My own kids are nervous of bats thanks to the cartoons they watch, and I'm a bat-licensed ecologist so I've tried pretty hard!

I always leave a cloth of some kind hanging down the side of the bath, the spider will eventually find it.

OP - worth reporting mink sightings to the British Mammalian Society (they have a long list of things they like reports on).

Me: come see this cool species. It's been around for three and a half billion years continuously, a real living fossil. That's three billion years before dinosaurs showed up, and it's just down the road and you can see it for yourself, and it's doing really well and nicely established in our local area.

Local Council: Stay away from the lake, no boating no swimming, Blue-Green Algae. Death! Panic!

Bats are amazing. We lived in an old converted mill for a while and they roosted somewhere near by. On summer evenings we’d turn the lights off, face the chairs towards the living room window and watch them flying about just the other side of the glass.

Perch
Panthers

Northerners.

I love magpies. We had some really tame ones nesting in the back garden as kids, they'd come when called and take food from your hand.
They're super intelligent. Beautiful birds.

Midges

Trying to be controversial 😆 Nobody likes midges.

those annoying scurrying big monsters… the delicate little gossamer Cellar Spiders will happily kill and eat them

I've seen it happen, it looks like a total mismatch then the cellar spider just effortlessly ****s the big one up. I have them in the corners of a few rooms, they never seem to be doing much but it's amazing how much detritus turns up below their haunts.

I've got to say I'm coming round to wasps after watching something about how they help keep aphids and other pests under control. They're still little buzzy bastards with hair-trigger tempers though.

Invasive non native species are a problem and they need management for genuine reasons - It’s an objective need rather than a response to disliking them.

Gulls... I don’t think we are meant to dislike gulls. They need people to protect them rather than dislike them. Herring gulls are on the red list and lesser black backs are amber.

They’re still little buzzy bastards with hair-trigger tempers though.

They're really not. If you start swatting them away maybe but you really have to provoke them.

Ticks we can all surely agree should just get to ****.

They’re really not. If you start swatting them away maybe but you really have to provoke them.

Must have different wasps around here as they are right testy little bastards. Flying up in your face like the asbo teenager of the insect world. They seem to get very aggressive towards the end of summer/beginning of autumn too. Utter ****s

Back to the original post, we had mink released not too far from the old office just north of Woodstock in Oxfordshire.
A few months later I was driving into work and a pair of them are fighting of the a freshly killed pheasant corpse. Neither would give way and they both kept staring my car until the pheasant came a part and they scampered of in different directions.
Beautiful looking things.
Like cats turned up to 11 on the killing scale.

Hippopotamuses. Everyone seems to hate on them, but I for one love their fat, shiny belligerent faces. Got a brace of them living in the eaves. Sometimes hear them shuffling around at night but generally keep themselves to themselves.

Hippopotamuses.

Hippopotamuses.

very dangerous though. Its estimated 500 people a year are killed by hippos. Usually when they fall off the roof - although its not uncommon for people to choke on them too.

They’re so dangerous because they are hungry, hungry hippos

Similiar to magpies, starlings- I know they're basically just flying rats but they're regular visitors in our garden and I I love 'em, always a bit of chaos and madness. They're lovely birds when they're in good health too, I think we're just a bit used to seeing beat up city scavengers.

Bit conflicted this but we've got a lot of birds in the garden and I always have food out for them, but we've also got loads of roaming neigbourhood cats- as a bird lover I should hate them and they steal the hedgehog food too but they're still always welcome.

Bats I love to see but having stayed in a house that was infested with them, they're only fine as long as they stay outside.

You called?

Here they are viscous little things

Nah, I've definitely seen them run.

Sharks, just incredible apex predators that we know very little about. They are certainly not the mindless killers that the press would have you believe

Bats are awesome flying mice, in Australia I had the most incredible bat interaction which I regard as a highlight of my life.

in Australia I had the most incredible bat interaction which I regard as a highlight of my life.

So it DIDN'T start in a in Wuhan lab!!!!!
😱

😂😂😂😂😂👍

Crows.
You have to admire their intelligence and aerobatic skills.
They can't land on our bird feeder in such a way as to get at the tube hanger that has the snacks in it.
So one of them stands on the ground and another one lands heavily on the top, making it scatter some of the food out. Very co-operative way of feeding.

They seem to get very aggressive towards the end of summer/beginning of autumn too

Pissed on fermented fruit. Very much like the asbo teenagers.

How can anyone not love bats? Apart from being the probable source of a worldwide pandemic, they are charming little fellas.

They seem to get very aggressive towards the end of summer/beginning of autumn too

They're just the product of some very harsh parenting. How would you feel if your mum had just chucked you out of your home to die?

Spent about ten minutes trapped in a small room last week trying to get a mahoosive hornet back out the window. Seriously impressive beastie which was at least twice as big as the biggest bumble bee I've ever seen. It about the size of a small bat.... (honestly).

Signal Crayfish. Horribly invasive species, that eats pretty much anything smaller than itself.

But, damn they're tasty 😋

Maggots…!!!

What’s not to like about their wriggly squigglyness?

Disco Rice

Grey squirrels and brown rats. We have a few that visit the tree stump near my shed office for food - we leave lots of bird feed out and old bread. Makes my day.

We've a massive bag of peanuts in my garage that hasn't been 'touched', nor do we have issues in the house garden (we have 4 indoor cats that have an outside run).

I'm a huge fan of pigeons and gulls - so perfectly adapted to their (current) environments. The low aspect ratio of a pigeon's wing is perfect for city life: quick turns, stop on a sixpence, etc. The perfectly aerodynamic body of a gull, with its high aspect ratio wings just "designed" for effortless flight... stunning.

It's like the avian equivalents of the F104 and U2 - the same plane, but not.

Perch
Panthers

What you did there? 👏🏻🎩

Similiar to magpies, starlings- I know they’re basically just flying rats but they’re regular visitors in our garden and I love ’em, always a bit of chaos and madness. They’re lovely birds when they’re in good health too, I think we’re just a bit used to seeing beat up city scavengers.

I think I’m feeding the entire starling population of three postcodes! Lovely little birds, noisy, argumentative, and always hungry, it seems. I’ve got a clear plastic seed feeder that nothing bothered with and it eventually went manky and mouldy, so after cleaning it out I thought I’d try putting mealworms in and see if any visitors would pay any attention.
Well, I fill it up late in the evening when I do the hedgehogs restaurant, and any other feeders that have got a bit low, and it’s empty by 6.30 in the morning. I’m spending £20+ a week on food for ‘the pets’, as Joey used to say, and I can only afford to fill it once a day. They do also have a bunch of feeders with suet pellets and suet balls in, and they can go through a whole pack of 12 suet balls a week.
Then there’s the kitty kibbles with soft centres for the hedgehogs…
Worse than bloody kids!
The wood pigeons do annoy me a bit, they’ll empty the sunflower seed feeders, depriving the goldfinches of their food, it’s a wonder the fat buggers can even fly! So I amuse myself by moving the feeders around, challenging the pigeons to try to get to them. Endless hours of fun watching them trying to figure out a way of stuffing their greedy faces!
The invasive neighbourhood cats, on the other hand… 🤯

Wasps get a bad rap but I adore the cheeky little rascals

Humans. The vast majority are selfish twunts but some seem relatively ok.

@Raceface90 - this map covers the part of Bath from the Batheaston roundabout in as far as Sidney Gardens, so should give you a clearer idea of where you saw the furry assassin!

Spent about ten minutes trapped in a small room last week trying to get a mahoosive hornet back out the window.

There was an item on the news probably 15 / 20 years ago about a couple who saw a queen hornet come in through their bedroom window. Rather than try and get it back out again or whack it with a slipper they thought it would be more interesting to let it settle there - then they watched it build a nest in the pelmet of their curtains and after a while had a whole hornet colony there. They just left the window ajar and carried on sleeping in the room happily letting the hornets  chew up their curtains and wallpaper to build the nest.

Saw a family of mink running along the bank of the Thames in Goring and we definitely thought they looked cute (appreciate that is really not the whole picture!).

Conversely though when I hear cuckoos I think of the baby birds kicked out the nest to their deaths and am not inclined to believe in a benevolent deity! Pretty vile when you think of it.

i just had a look on the strava map.

i think it was at batheaston gardens over river avon (bridge) that i saw the mink.

it was about 3 - 3 1/2 miles from bath city centre on the cycleway sign i remember.

I think I’m feeding the entire starling population of three postcodes! Lovely little birds, noisy, argumentative, and always hungry, it seems.

My garden appears to be a sparrow, starling and jackdaw hangout. I have to shut the window for calls.

@poly

It's a fraught conversation with a very curious child. I know all about the conservation angle but underneath it there are some really interesting ethical judgements around the relative value of animals and the application of different ethical standards to different species.

"We don't like them because they're from America"
"We don't like them because they're coming over here, taking our nuts from hard working British squirrels"
"Filthy foreign blighters riddled with disease"
"Go ask your mum"

@tomd - well if you go out of your way to anthropomorphize it into some sort of racist issue perhaps - but actually far more sensible to explain it in terms of evolution, ecosystems, and disease resistance. If you want to anthropomorphize you can probably make analogies about europeans bringing disease to native Americans and almost wiping them out, or even how its a bit like travel restrictions with Covid, and until you have immunity in vulnerable populations you don't want the asymptomatic disease carriers mingling with them.

I think I’m feeding the entire starling population of three postcodes!

The ones in my garden are currently a bit irate since they need to wait for the next delivery of fatballs and suet.
Starlings are amazingly beautiful when seen close up or through a decent lens. The colours are fantastic. Well aside from the young at this time of year which despite being the size of the parents still hassle them for food.

Well aside from the young at this time of year which despite being the size of the parents still hassle them for food.

This behaviour does amuse me. Dude, it's right by your feet! It'll be a lot quicker and easier to just bend you neck down.

I watched one of the local ferry men,when I lived in Scotland, beat a mink to death with an iron bar on the pier in front of some terrified American tourists. That was an interesting tea break.

Thanks for the parenting tips @Poly, I'll probably save them for when they won't fall asleep.

Wasps, flies, squirrels pigeons etc, yep they are all good. We had a neighbour who was paranoid about wasps . She spent more time and energy on her obsession maintaining constant vigilance. I explained to her the tragedy of how they are ejected from their nest etc, made no difference. Just for a laugh we put out some jam on a spoon and told her that if she could feed the birds we could feed the wasps. The wasps loved it and we ended up feeling responsible for them so even though our batty neighbour has moved we still put out wasps food at that time of year