As usual I put the bird food out and the decided to sit in the sun for a few minutes before I started anything, and that's when I saw the new resident rat! He was very brave, coming from behind the wood store onto the peanuts in the feeder and really not worrying that I was there at all
Ant arrived shortly afterwards. The plan was to burn all the roots and remaining rohdie, although it was a big pile and I did not think we would do it all in one day. After some discussion and a bit of googling we decided the rat had to go, so Ant went and got his air rifle while I minded the new fire. When he got back Ant shot at it but, although he may have hit it he didn't kill it and from then on then it was much more cautious. We did see it (or a rat at least) over by the stream and in the camp by Forests stump in the morning but not at all after that.
The fire went well, it was hot dirty work, on the hottest day of the year so far, but it was a huge fire and by the end of the day everything was on and burning. Flee and Tracey arrived about 5 and we had a nice evening round the fire
I had a good lie in on Sunday morning, the jet lag helping me sleep till 10! We had breakfast and Flee found what seemed to be the rats nest in Immac.
For the rest of the morning Tracey and I pulled bracken up by the hive and I dug out the last stump up by the cars. The oak saplings seem to have recovered quite a bit since last week so hopefully they will all make it after all.
Ant cleared the last choppings from his side and Flee started the mammoth task of clearing brambles in the wayleave over the other side of the stream. Ant and I went home about lunchtime while Flee and Tracey stayed Sunday night too.
I went down on Tuesday after work to try and have another shot at the rat but there was no sign of him. I did lose my glasses though and spent a good hour looking for them before finally finding them by the dam on Wednesday lunchtime.
