"TheScullster" wrote in message
. uk...

"Christina Websell" wrote


"TheScullster" wrote in message
. uk...
Hi all

Anyone suggest the likely culprit for:

Animal poo approx 10mm diameter - 3 pcs - 1 @ 25mm long and 2 @ 10mm
long - in cluster on lawn.
Similar to cat but - no smell, dry and like charcoal in appearance.
Close examination showed what looked like lots of "beetle-shell-bits"
embedded, which created the charcoal appearance.


I might have said fox until you mentioned there was no smell. It seems
too big for a hedgehog, could it possibly be pellets from a bird of prey?
Just a thought.

Tina

Thanks Tina

Don't know much about birds of prey but it's possible. We live at the top
of a hill v. close to the edge of a housing estate. There are a lot of
sparrow hawk-type-things which hang around on the lamp posts of major
roads nearby. There are one or two owls around although I have'nt
actually seen either in our copper beech (near which the poo? was found).
Are bird pellets usually round or can they be sausage shaped?

They are sausage shaped.

Hedgehogs were suggested by a neighbour - again I haven't seen them and
also haven't suffered from vegetable damage (if they eat them).

No, hedgehogs don't eat vegetables. They are mainly carnivores, they like
slugs n snails and such sort of stuff.

The least likely I think would be a fox; although they are occasionally
spotted, our garden has a perimeter fence and I don't think there are any
breaches big enough.

Fox poo smells quite pungent and usually has a pointed "tail" on it.
It could a very big hedgehog with a large, erm, b*mh*le, as they often have
beetle wings in their dung. So do birds of prey in their pellets though.
You'll have to decide for yourself what is most likely. If you have a tree
branch overhanging where it was found it's probably pellets.
Your eco-system is very healthy if you have birds of prey.

Tina