Too cold for the badgers to come out

Glossop, Derbyshire It was immediately clear why the Peak District looked so verdant even in the height of what we must call summer

A roaring log fire on a summer night might be considered an indulgence, but as the temperature dropped towards single figures it seemed more like a necessity. The previous half hour had been spent standing silently in the wooded gulley below the house watching the more obvious entrances of the badgers' sett, at a discreet distance from across the stream.

Related: The night visitors