THE SPRING HABITS OF BRITISH QUADRUPEDS.
THE first really warm days of spring tempt the shyest, and even the night-feeding animals, to show themselves and revel in the sun. On such a morning last week, a hedge- hog appeared on the lawn within a few yards of the house. The white pigeons which were sunning themselves on the roof instantly flew down to see what he was, and after they had satisfied their curiosity, we sat down to watch him. The hedgehog was evidently determined to make the most of the first springlike day, to get enough food to make up for his winter fast. He was so busy hunting for insects, that he let us approach within a few yards, and observe his method of finding them. Clearly he worked wholly by scent; for he moved his head slowly from side to side as he walked, and every now and then would stop and try a few inches of ground again, like a spaniel who thinks he can just trace the scent of a rabbit. Sometimes he thrust his sharp nose under a plantain. leaf, or downwards to the roots of the grass, and captured a small worm. If the worm objected to come out of the hole, "piggy," with his head on one side, gently scratched away the grass with his right fore-paw and extracted him. Apparently most of the insects were tiny slugs, which gave him less trouble. His gait was like that of an elderly and sub- stantial toad, a slow, crawling walk. He stood higher from the ground than might be thought, and the hind-legs showed plainly behind his body, as did his tail, which was fully half- an-inch long. At a distance, his rounded back and long head made him look like a bear, seen through the wrong end of a telescope. We came within two yards of him, but he took no notice till he got to leeward. Then he put up his head and snuffed suspiciously, peering at us with his little beady eyes. We made a slight movement. Instantly he dropped his head, and his spines bristled as he prepared to roll himself up. As we kept still, he relaxed, and began to crawl rapidly away, keeping very close to the ground.
In the afternoon there was a slight thunder-shower. This brought him out again. The east wind had blown down leaves from the ilex and ivy. These he turned over with his long, flexible nose, and found something edible under many. Though we got a pair of glasses and watched him closely, his food was so minute that we could not identify the insects. At last he walked up, moving his head from side to side like a pig routing in straw, and as there was no room to pass between the writer's foot and a large stone, he scrambled over his boot, after snuffing curiously at the leather. Then he looked at the other boot, and came back between his legs. Cramped by remaining still so long, the writer moved. " Piggy " stopped, and looked up sideways, in a suspicious manner. He had knocked the
• it is possible, at all events, that the potsherds dug up by Sir Charles Lyall from beneath the delta of Egypt, are twenty thousand years old. They are cer- tainly elder than any other manufactured thing.
hair off the middle of his nose, which gave him rather a dis- reputable air; this, with his bright little eyes and prominent ears, made him look so droll, that it was impossible to help laughing at him. He resented this, and clambering over the border of great flints, marched resolutely into the bushes. It was pro- bably hunger as much as the desire for warmth that brought the hedgehog out. Unlike Signor Suoci, he does not break his fast gradually ; and when once he has awakened from his winter sleep in a hedge-bottom or old rabbit-hole, and got rid of the great coat of leaves which encircles him like the crud of a dumpling, he eats day and night.
But the sudden renewal of light and warmth throws many of our wild animals into an ecstasy of pleasure. The writer has seen one of the otters at the Zoo lying on his back, rolling, bathing, in the sunlight, after a spell of east winds ; not grinning, like the wicked otter in "The Water-Babies," but smiling sweetly, patting his stomach with his fore-paws, and letting his cheeks be rubbed like a cat. The wild ones then leave the coast and work up the rivers, playing about the fords and feeding at night, and by day sunning themselves on the crowns of pollard willows or the warm dead flags in the osier-beds. About May the little otters are born, pretty, bright-eyed creatures, active as a seal in the water or a weasel on land. The warmth brings the chub and barbel, carp and tench, from the deep waters, and the hungry family need never want a meal.
Early in spring the dog-foxes travel great distances to find their mates, and on still evenings their cry may be heard plainly, three short, husky barks, like the cough of a dog with a bone in his throat. The vixen occasionally utters a plaintive howl, a weird, uncomfortable noise. The first cubs are dropped early in the middle of March, sometimes in some large earth that has been used for years, but frequently in a hole which the vixen has made for herself. Unlike the otters, foxes do not resent the presence of others of their species in their hunting-grounds. A pair of otters will monopolise miles of river; but if there is plenty of game and the covers are quiet, half-a-dozen vixens may take up their quarters in one square mile. The quantity of food which the cubs require is extraordinary ; and if the fox were not the most cunning as well as one of the most active and enduring of animals, the old ones would find it bard to satisfy them. Fortunately for the mothers of large families—for they sometimes have as many as seven in a litter—the cubs are omnivorous feeders, and, except snakes or stoats, will eat almost anything. Fish, frogs, rats, small birds, field-mice, rabbits, and all kinds of game are their usual fare. The vixens prowl round every fowl-house in the parish at least once a week. They will climb an ivy-covered tree and catch a wood-pigeon on her nest, or hide in a patch of rashes and catch the moor-hen as she swims from her island-home to the bank. Meantime, the father of the family leads a comfortable bachelor life, spending the warm days curled up in a snug nest in the long, dry grass, with a good thick tuft between him and the wind, or, if the day be very calm, he slips into the crown of a pollard, and sleeps there.
Rats make a total change of their domicile in spring. They desert the corn-stacks and outhouses for the field-banks, generally choosing some place near a pond or stream. Not that they imitate the water-rats, who may be seen in the dusk swimming resolutely for miles along the quiet waters of the canal to seek their mates. The male rats form bachelor colonies, while the does make separate burrows and nests for their young. These are often in most unlikely spots, far from houses or barns; for the papa rats are quite inclined to eat the little ones, and are quarrelsome and noisy. The does are devoted mothers, ready to defend their brood from stoat or weasel, and even dashing out to give battle to more formidable enemies. The writer was once crossing a fence with a small
spaniel, when a shriek from the dog made him think she was caught in a gin. But a fierce tussel in the grass and brambles
at the bottom of the ditch followed, and he saw that she had been attacked by a huge rat, which was hanging to her lip like a bulldog, and did not release her until killed by a stick.
Badgers, which hibernate completely in Sweden, only sleep for short intervals in our winter. But they, like the other creatures, will show themselves by day in the first week of warmth and sun. A model family of badgers, which were carefully watched by a good observer, left their burrow first in the middle of March, and began to carry in dry fern.
They always cleaned their feet on a bough before going into the burrow. The young were seen in June, but were probably born a month earlier. The number is from three to five. It is generally agreed by those who live where badgers are not uncommon, that if they meet a hedgehog taking a spring walk, poor " piggy's " days are numbered. The badger cares no more for his spines than for the stings of the sleepy wasps whose nests he digs up at night, and eats him up alive, leaving nothing but his skin, turned neatly inside out, like a rabbit's on a coster's barrow.
But perhaps the happiest of all our animals in spring are the squirrels. This winter was so mild, that they had no need to use up their winter stores, and could get some sort of green food ; for squirrels no more care to live on nuts than we should on beef. But usually they are as pleased with the return of spring as the larks themselves. They nibble the young shoots, strip the bark from the twigs as the sap runs up, and scamper from tree to tree as if life were almost too well worth living. Before long, if you watch the nest, tiny squirrels, perfect as their parents, but no larger than big mice, appear, and the family keeps together till autumn.
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