Mysterious black creature in my garden (not horsey)

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pennyturner

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I was clearing dense ivy from a large oak tree this morning. As I sawed away a section of vine, a critter, about four inches long shot downwards across the area I had cleared and disappeared into the dense foliage below. I only got a very quick glimpse.

My first thought was 'how could a mole be up a tree', as it was inky black and sort of velvety. As far as I saw, it had no tail. Could it have been a mouse, or even a bat? - it scampered like a mouse, but I thought all wild mice were brown. No sign of any wings or great big batty feet. Didn't see it's face as it was going downhill.

Any ideas?
 
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pennyturner

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I don't think it was a rat. I've seen plenty of them before!

Vole is possible ycbm. I've only ever seen the little water voles down by the river, and they're most definitely brown... and a bit bigger. There are several species, I think, and I understand that both voles' and shrews' colour is affected by what they eat.

Having done a little web-sleuthing, I'm erring towards Water Shrew. as it's fur was strikingly mole-like. Even though we aren't by a river, the whole area is criss-crossed by little streams, and apparently the juveniles go walkabout, and quite like woods.
 
Mrs B

Mrs B

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Was also going to say mink? Their tails aren't always that noticeable and as Oz says, they move like poo off a shovel (sorry to paraphrase, Oz!)
 
Pinkvboots

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We have weasels in our garden often when up in the small hours you can see them playing on the patio, and very occasionally I see them run across my field they are very quick,
 
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HashRouge

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Pinkvboots said:
We have weasels in our garden often when up in the small hours you can see them playing on the patio, and very occasionally I see them run across my field they are very quick,
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I was going to suggest a weasel too but they do have tails and the colour is wrong. Might be too big as well. Not sure How good a look the OP got though.
 
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pennyturner

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Not at all weasely or minky. Much shorter in the body, and far too mall - although it could of course have been a baby of whatever the heck it was. Good suggestions though.

I like the idea of having discovered some kind of arboreal mole, previously unknown to science.
 
Pigeon

Pigeon

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Those black voles are so cute!!!

It could be a domestic something gone wild - we had dwarf hamsters living under the floor boards for several months before we caught them again - they'd gone white!! It could be a hamster, they can be suprisingly quick and actually cope well with the cold.

Maybe leave a snack out for it in the tree and see if it returns?

Fingers crossed for a tree mole, you could get the species named after you :p
 
suffolkmare

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Ok, quite a few interesting suggestions but what OP saw was black/dark, around 4 in long, no clear tail, in ivy/old tree... so I reckon most likely would be melanistic mouse or vole, or shrew, hibernating bat not awake enough to fly - but likely to be others as they roost communally, mole that for some reason did manage to get there (had been caught & dropped there by a cat??), escaped hamster... ah just seen someone else has said that too!
 
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