Rats nest.

I first discovered my local rats nest when I saw a magpie hopping up and down, some movement on the ground turned out to be a rat. Checking the hedge where the magpie had been  I found a hole and decided it would be a good place to come back to some evening and watch. That first evening there were quite a few rats emerging from the main hole and a smaller hole by the base of the hawthorn bush.

I was passing by the other day and checking the rats nest I noticed the main entrance had been enlarged and near by there was a new perfectly round hole. I decided to visit the holes again to see what was going on.

As the evening wore on I kept seeing heads popping out of the main large hole but they were not coming out. I changed my position as I had a thought it might be me stopping them coming out.

I had no sooner moved when the biggest rat I've ever seen came running over to the nest area right from were I'd been standing only minutes before.

During the time at the nest the rat went up into the hawthorn bush several times unfortunatley I could not get a picture of it in the bush (I checked the bush in the daylight there does not seem to be any nests there.)

When I was checking my photos I noticed that it was the same rat running about all night because the end of it's tail is missing.

High cold winds and wanting to be up early in the morning brought the session to an end.