Stoats are long and thin and are related to weasels and otters.They are active in both the day and the night and are very good hunters. They mainly eat small animals. Their young are called 'kits' and they have one litter per year of 6-12. 

You may see a stoat in open grassland, or running across a path.

Butterflies go through four stages in their life cycle: egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, and adult. The mother butterfly lays her eggs on a plant, which will be the caterpillar's first food. The caterpillar grows and attaches itself to a support, like a twig, to form a chrysalis. When the chrysalis opens, the adult butterfly emerges.

The butterfly in the picture is a Small Tortoiseshell. 

Snails have soft bodies, no legs, and large, spiral-shaped shells. Their bodies are made up of five basic parts: a head, neck, visceral hump, tail, and foot. Snails have a ribbon-like tongue called a radula, which has thousands of tiny teeth.

Snails are known for moving slowly and eating plants in gardens.

Frogs like to live in damp places, like near to ponds, or in long grass or undergrowth. Adult frogs eat mainly insects (they especially like flies), slugs and worms. 

In spring they breed and produce frog spawn, which turns into tadpoles and then young frogs. 

Owls are nocturnal, which means they are most active at night. To help them find and catch their food they have very large eyes and special feathers that help them fly very quietly. They can also turn their heads almost backwards!

The picture is a tawny owl, and we have lots of those in Norsey Wood. If you come here at night you will hear them calling. 

There are 5 species of mouse native to the UK, and the rarest one, the hazel dormouse, has been found in Norsey Wood. 

Hazel dormice are only 6-9cm long (double that with their long bushy tail!) and live up in the trees. They also sleep all day and come out at night, so they're very hard to spot. 

There are three snakes native to the UK, grass snakes, smooth snakes and adders. Snakes have ears inside their heads, not outside like humans, and they don't have eyelids. They smell with their tongues, using organs called Jacobson's Organs. Snakes shed their skin periodically because it doesn't grow at the same rate as their bodies.

The snake in the picture is an adder, which is the only venomous snake in the UK.

Squirrels live in trees and build nests called dreys. Dreys are messy-looking balls of sticks that are about the size of a football and lined with soft materials like moss, leaves, grass, and shredded bark. 

Grey squirrels eat a variety of foods, including nuts, acorns, tree seeds, flowers, buds, shoots, pine cones, and occasionally young birds and eggs. They also eat insects and will take food from bird feeders in gardens. 

Badgers live in underground burrows and tunnels called setts in grasslands and woodlands. A badger's territory may include a main sett and several smaller setts, and the setts can be hundreds of years old and have multiple entrances. 

Badgers are nocturnal, but may forage during the day if food is scarce. They can run up to 19 miles per hour for short periods of time. Badgers don't bring food into their setts to keep them clean, and they even have communal toilets outside of the setts.

Foxes can live in many different habitats, including the countryside and cities. They are adaptable and can survive in most environments.

Foxes are nocturnal, meaning they are most active at night, but they may also be active during the day. Some foxes are crepuscular, meaning they are most active at dawn and dusk. They eat almost anything, including meat, berries, worms, spiders, and even jam sandwiches.