Living by the Rochdale Canal I am fortunate to enjoy the many goings on both on the water and the towpath opposite my boat.

Having recently completed two four hour walks along sections of both the Leeds & Liverpool Canal and the Lancaster Canal I have been inspired to create a new series of posts based primarily on my encounters with the creatures native to the environment of the frequent towpath walks I undertake and also those on the mooring itself.

'Tales of the Riverbank' was a children's TV series narrated by Johnny Morris in the early sixties and originally, having sighted a herd of cows by the Lancaster Canal, I had thought of calling this thread 'Tails of the Canal bank'. Whilst the TV series did feature mainy creatures with tails it is rare to actually see rodents thus the more fitting title for this thread which offers greater scope. Having said that there are plenty of fish in the canal (I saw a shoal of mature tench the other day) and also numerous species of birds in the immediate habitat.

Yesterday, on the Lancaster Canal, I enjoyed one of my most peaceful and scenic walks in a while - I witnessed half a dozen herons, dozens of swans, several familes of ducks, dragonflies, damselflies, literally hundreds of butterflies and fortunately very few bipeds of the human kind. The abundance of wildlife was also matched by signs of death - a couple of freshly-deceased pigeons and a cow stood forlornly by its stillborn calf.