Who has been eating fruit from my garden?

[Jazz12]

Our garden is fully fenced. I left a small piece of apple in a little bowl the other day (leftovers from a baby niece) for the birds. No birds touched it all day. Next morning it was all gone! I put some fruit out last night, it’s again gone by morning! I haven’t seen any hedgehogs in my garden ever, only little mice that too in summer. Didn’t see the mice for months now. What/who is eating the fruit? I’d love to continue feeding if they won’t cause nuisance to my neighbours.

I’d love to help with Hedgehogs. will look up. Thanks!

A fox can easily get over a 5ft fence and I saw more foxes in South west London when I lived there than I have ever seen in Devon

Food is on the ground in a little plastic baby bowl

You could do a bit of sleuthing for poo - rats leave small rounded/oval pellets (and you can see the smooth paths they make through grass and over flower beds). Foxes leave poos like small dog poo, but usually full of things like apple pips, cherry stones, fur from mice or rabbits they have caught - anything and everything basically. In a city, doubtless sweet wrappers and chicken bones from abandoned takeways and bins as well!

If you want to rule out foxes, leave out a random object that can be shredded - a shoe or cushion. If you wake up to a mess of shredded item, it’s probably a fox.

I would say a fox as well

Foxes, rats or owls. Bloody owls are driving me mad round here with their screaming

Foxes or elves, but my money is on foxes.

Can you beg/borrow a camera to film your garden overnight?

Squirrel.

But theres loads that would, lots of birds would nab it, foxes might, rats easily would, deer might.

Fascinating, the stuff that frequents peoples gardens and the home owners have nooooo idea. I spotted mink and muntjac in my North Manchester garden, spitting distance of the M66, also Jays, squirrels, foxes, weasels, stoats, loads of small brown birds... most of the other people in the same run of gardens as me had barely spotted more than small brown birds and squirrels.

Where I live now, those with the more open plan gardens are seeing otters and several species of deer as well as the more usual suspects. No otters in mine, tis a concrete yard with a six foot fence all around, but I have had a sparrowhawk, a male pheasant and a spotty woodpecker this week alone.

Rats or mice

We are also in a very busy town, we have had foxes, badgers, hedgehogs, squirrels, red kites and bats in the garden at various times. It’s amazing really. I want to get one of those wildlife cameras. I thought it was a silly idea when we first moved here but I’ve been so pleasantly surprised.

Rats

We have a 7ft brick wall at the end of our garden and I saw a bushy red fox tail disappearing over it the other morning! It's peak fox breeding time right now and they are very active, even in urban areas

We have 6’ high walls and last week I watched a rat climb over from next door, pinch some nuts from the bird table which was hanging from a bracket on the wall and climb back over. She was very cute but I don’t want to encourage her so I’ve moved the bird table.

I’ve also watched a squirrel jump over the wall, pinch a whole apple from our tree and run off with it.

Why do you think it isnt rats?

Our fully fenced London garden has frequent fox visitors. Caught two on video playing with a knocking over the snowman we'd made. Also regularly see the squirrels eating fruit from the tree. They get them off the neighbours trees and then drop the pips in our garden.

Squirrels eat all the fruit in ours but I have seem a huge fox clear our 6ft fence, made so much noise and scared the shit out of me when i was in garden.

I live in a London semi, surrounded by 5ft fences with trellis on top.

We are overrun with foxes in our garden, as are all our neighbours.

Rats or foxes, especially an urban area.

We watched a young fox one morning, 8am daylight, follow the path my cat does... Up onto 5ft fence, up onto shed roof 2 ft higher, down our 6 ft fence and then just trotted towards the car flap!

Rats are everywhere - you can't keep them out either.

Car flap does of course mean 4x4 entrance! I mean *cat.

Squirrel.
I found one in my bird table a couple of weeks ago while it was still dark one morning.
He's been back a few times, cheeky bugger, but it's winter and it's cold and he's eating "yesterdays" food iyswim.

Foxes, like cats, are liquid.

If it was our resident squirrel the dozy sausage tends to bring us more food than he takes as our back garden has been designated prime food burial land 😂 However the foxes will eat anything they find and tend to just leave me the wrapping from whatever they have bought our way . Whatever we leave out wouldn’t be there the next morning between them though.

Can you put a camera out there? I love little mysteries. We have rabbits, groundhogs, squirrels of course, all kinds of critters. Keep us posted.

'Foxes can climb most fences. Foxes are able to jump up to 3 feet, and their claws enable them to climb even beyond 6 feet. Sometimes they will even climb neighboring objects like trees in order to get over a fence.'

There are also flying foxes, but you would probably spot them because of their navigation lights!