Standing on the doorstep (having a smoke outside because of our new baby) as I have done so often during the four sleepless weeks we have had here, I never realised how much wildlife is right here in front of me.

We have more than 50 starlings, drifting from each TV aerial, waiting for the neighbourhood cats to vanish so they can swoop down on the new bird table, set up in the garden directly opposite our house.
Watching them are a pair of black headed gulls? that are not interested in the bread and nuts put out, but watching for where the food is being taken so they can raid the nest and eat the young of the starlings.

To the back of our house stands the last remains of an old cotton mill, with its huge mill chimney (still in working order) where pigeons like to hang out, it is not uncommon for a kestrel or hawk to swoop to feed on the young birds, who appear totally oblivious to the dangers around them.
During my nightly cigarettes, I have witnessed a female hedgehog and her young pass my gate and wonder down the street. The few resident garages, on a small plot, which are about 6 doors down from our house, often has a young fox snooping around and casually walking up the street towards the main road running parallel to our street.

In the back garden we have seen a yellow wagtail (which is quite rare I am told?) this summer and regularly have finches, blue tits and the good old robin visiting us throughout the year.
In late summer evenings, we have a family of bats swooping to feed on the midgies that are everywhere. They used to live in the old mill to the back of us, it was thought that the new housing development built around the old mill in the last couple of years, which took away trees and a stream that was there would damage the local wildlife, but as more and more people on our street plant trees, shrubs and flowers, the local wildlife hasn't decreased, but increased!

Our local wildlife has evolved and found new ways to increase their numbers and feed, mother nature is a powerful thing ;)