Badgers are really great road makers

I WENT for a walk in a wood the other day with a friend of mine.

It was a mixed woodland belonging to Coillte with free public access and I’d never been in it before. There was a reason for our visit. We’re both involved in bringing school children on nature walks and we wanted to see if the place would be suitable and interesting for this sort of activity.

It was supposed to be business, but it was actually very pleasant: a sunny evening with beams of light shooting down from the canopy of new beech and ash leaves and illuminating the woodland floor, which was carpeted with flowering wild garlic and bluebells.