[All pictures of garden wildlife on this page are thumbnails. Click on any thumbnail for a large format to be displayed.]

Introduction to mammals (Mammalia)

Mammals (including humans) are warm-blooded creatures have an internal skeleton of bones and the whole body structure is packed in skin. The skin is more or less covered with hair. With an exception of a very small group of extremely primitive mammals they all give birth to more or less fully developed young. After birth most young are kept alive by their mothers by means of feeding milk. This milk is produced by specialised glands referred to as mammas, hence the name of the group. Mammals have conquered the world: most live on or close to the ground level, but many are also able to climb on rocks and trees. Most are capable of swimming, but some, like whales and dolphins, fully returned to the water environment. Being so succesful it is actually amazing that only a very small group learned how to fly (bats). Even though some other species, such as flying squirrels, may glide through the air, they actually can not really fly on their own. Mammals vary from very small, such as shrews and mice, to extremely big, such as whales. Among them are numerous carnivores, such as cats and wolves, omnivores, such as humans and bears, and herbivores, such as rabbits and cows. In an everyday, commonly sized garden there are not too many species to appear, not counting man's pets of course. Very common in many gardens are insectvores: rather small, primitive mammals that feed on insects, worms, woodlice and such. Shrews are probably quite common in most gardens, but rarely noticed. The Hedgehog is a much better known visitor and much more popular than shrews.

The beautiful European Red Squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris), a clown in the garden.

If you live near forests squirrels might appear in your garden from time to time. In Europe these are beautiful red squirrels, except for major parts of Britain where it has been replaced by the more cheeky American grey squirrels. Squirrels are rodents and like other rodents they are vegetarians mainly. Should they discover an egg or a young bird in spring, they will not hesitate to eat it though. Other rodents are likely to appear in gardens as well, but they live there quitely and are hardly ever noticed. These are usually the unwelcome guests: mice and rats. In spite of humans' attempts trying to get rid of them for thousands of years they stubbornly stay as the have learned to adapt themselves quickly. For humans the presnce of these rodents in and around the house is a health risk. At the same time humans are a great source of food and warmth hence so difficult to chase them away. These rodents are not picky about food and especially rats will eat almost anything.

To the left the popular Hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus). To the right the far less popular and rare seen White-toothed Shrew (Crocidura russula). Both are insectivores.

Rabbits are also regularly seen in many gardens and are real unwelcome visitors. They will not only eat part of your carefully selected garden plants, preferring young ones, but they will also dig holes, destroying other plants as well. Like rodents rabbits may occur in great numbers. The rabbit population is however extremely variable. This is mainly due to the animal's little resistance to certain diseases, some of which may kill up to 90% of the population. If it does, one's garden could be rabbit free for many years to come. But one day, they'll probably be back...

Funny creatures, but a pest in the garden: Rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus).

Other mammals that are likely to appear and also very unwanted are moles. They are relatives of the Hedgehog and shrew, but spend their life underground digging deep and long tunnels. Doing so they regularly throw up the unwanted sand, the typical mole hills, which could ruin your entire garden. No mole is on our site though, for we were lucky enough not to have them in our garden. Other mammals that sometimes pop up in gardens are mustelids and foxes. None of those are in our garden, or they are but we haven't been able to take decent pictures of them.
On this site you'll find pages about the following species:
1 The Rabbit,
2 The Squirrel,
3 The Hedgehog,
4 The White-toothed Shrew.