I found another half-eaten rat skull, lodged in the crack under the rear byre door this morning. It's the second in a week. Not quite like a scene from the God Father, and one that perhaps counter-intuitively, raised my spirits. Why? It's more evidence that our little stoat lodger has been plying his/her trade.

Last year I noticed that the new byre door bottom has been gnawed, and I wasn't too chuffed, wondering if it was a rat. However the evidence of some scat pointed to a weasel or stoat. This winter there's no question it's a stoat as we spotted him/her a dozen times, either brazenly hopping past the kitchen window in broad daylight carrying a mouse/vole/chunk of rabbit,and we've clearly seen the tracks in the snow heading from or to the gap under the byre door.

S/he seems unperturbed by my daily visiting to refill the coal scuttle, and best of all we've not had any of the usual uninvited rodent visitors in the walls or roof spaces this winter, keeping us awake some nights. The frisson of spotting our lodger is a delight, as s/he hops along the top of a stone wall, or between the parked cars in the yard. I was amazed to watch him/her deftly hop right through one of the holes in the chicken wire, along the fence, we use to try to keep the rabbits out of the garden. Stoats are obviously considerably slimmer than they might first appear. Who needs a moggy to feed or pay vets bills for ?