Badger Latrine

For the last kilometre or so before it reaches the Sound of Mull the Allt Choiremhuilinn runs through a steep-sided glen which is heavily wooded, many of the trees being old but rather stunted and moss-encrusted oak. This must be prime badger territory but it wasn't until our walk on Monday that we found....

....concrete evidence of their presence, in the form of three recently-used badger latrines.

One of the ways of recognising badger poo here is that it often contains the carapaces of beetles, which....

....can be clearly seen at top right of this picture, but what was of more interest was the gold-headed very-much-alive beetle which was crawling around on top of the latrine.

It's a red-breasted carrion beetle, Oiceoptoma thoracicum, so called because both adults and larvae hunt for the larvae of other insects, such as flies, eating from the remains. It's described as widespread but not particularly common in Britain.