Hi Folks, I've been really curious as to what animal left these quite large bean shaped droppings I came across a few weeks ago. Never seen anything like it before, but I'm hardly any kind of expert on the subject. This is in Moray in the north east of Scotland in some pretty unused forestry land but only a few miles from farm land. Any of you good people have an idea?

Brian.

Hello McBlue, welcome to WildlifeUK!

I am not entirely sure what left these; could they be deer droppings? They could possibly be wild boar as well. Do you get any of these animals where you live?

Looks like Horse S**t to me!

Tut tut Paul, tut tut! I actually aggree with him there, it does look like horse excrament. Congratulations on your 400th post by the way!

Hi Jamie, thanks for the welcome. Plenty of deer around here and droppings to be found everywhere, but I’ve never seen any this size, or colour. The biggest were about the size of a hens egg. They looked mainly composed of grass or straw or similar plant material. We have fox, badger and all the usual smaller mammals, but this is not like anything I’ve seen before. I was thinking it may be some out of the ordinary farm animal that had escaped that I wouldn’t know what their droppings looked like - goat or reindeer perhaps? I’d never considered wild boar and certainly never heard of any round these parts.

I’d considered horse Paul, but again never seen any like this. It may be a pony I suppose, I’m not up on my horse dung other than what is normally see on the paths and roads round here. It is usually looser, wetter and darker and never in such well formed pellets.

Brian.

This post was last modified: 24-03-2008 08:16 PM by McBlue.

I really dont know then Brian, sorry! As previously stated, I think that the best options are deer, horse or possible farm animals, like pigs goats etc.

You know, I fully expected to find a website with something like a poo identification guide with photos you could match things up to. If there was not some official and serious site on the subject I felt sure one of those “bushcraft” sites would have something on it. Oh well, it’s not important Jamie, like everything else I’m sure an answer will present itself in due time.

Thanks.

If you say it is composed of Grass etc it is probably herbivore so you can rule out badger. Its too large and grassy for deer, they have small pellets (and lots of them).Its definately not fox so I'd still go with horse or pony.

wasn't there a thread on polar bears in scotland.....................

Now that would be a frightening prospect and would somewhat change my walking habits. I also like a spot of wild camping, the thought of polar bears in them there hills would probably put me off ever venturing out again.

I would go with the majority, and say horse. Actually, more like pony, from the size.

Scat from animals will always vary depending on diet. Horses fed on one diet (mostly grass and pasturage) will produce loose, wet, green droppings. Horses which produce hard scat, such as this, could have been fed on grass hay, had too little water, or just dry hay in general.

Kingfisher

I think it would put me off too! Although I think they would probably stand out like a sore thumb in scotland.

I think my guess would be a pony too, although they do look different.

Thanks folks - I agree a pony that ate mostly straw the day before does sound like a reasonable candidate. However I have never seen any horse tracks or droppings before on the paths and dirt tracks surrounding this particular area, so it would have to have been a solitary escaped pony moving through the dense pine woodlands. There are horses about 4 miles form here so a wandering pony is not unfeasible. Can horse droppings be this shape? They were sort of kidney-bean or peanut shaped. Aren’t the dry type horse droppings more round?

They are not the normal shape, but they are just way too large for any of the normal wild animals to be found in the UK.

So, either pony, or perhaps a foal.

Kingfisher

Well people I think I can safely say my mystery animal was indeed a horse after all. I was there yesterday again and not 20 feet from the original site there were more droppings that had a definite look of horse about them. They were slightly bigger but some did have that ‘peanut’ shape that I had seen earlier. The clincher however were hoof tracks. Very few full prints and none where I could tell if the horse had been shoed or not, but enough to sure it was a horse. So no exotic species roaming these woods after all.

Thanks All
Brian.