As the snow swept down I was warm in my living room watching a house spider spin its web. I had a word with my wife and we agreed to leave it alone until it moved of its own accord.

Later in the day I cleared the snow from my drive and found that my wing mirror was strung up with the web of a garden spider. I removed it all into an old rose bush.

These two sightings set me thinking about spiders. Ever since little Miss Muffet sat on her tuffet eating her curds and whey people have been scared of spiders.

When it is realised that Dr Thomas Muffet (1553-1604) was a physician and an expert on spiders, who believed that eating them cured digestive orders and coughs, we know why it was that he invented the rhyme.

This persuaded her to take her medicine which involved eating spiders. I’m happy to have saved my two spiders last week, but I’m hanged if I’m going to eat them!

Spiders, like insects are jointed-legged animals belonging to the arthropods. They are, however, distinguished by having eight legs and not six and having a body divided into two parts and not three as is the case with insects.

Spiders are classed as arachnids which also includes mites and harvestmen. There are more than 600 species which makes them hard to study.

Most are very small but the house and garden spiders are quite large and I was pleased to give two web spinners a helping hand this winter.

Rats prove their intelligence

None of us like these unwanted guests, but we have to wonder why they have been so successful. The reason is easy to understand – they are intelligent but they are also adaptable.

A few years ago I helped in a survey to find out how they survived cold winters. While carrying out this project in 1982, I photographed a brown rat eating ice, but this was because all the free water was frozen.

In the same week I photographed a house mouse eating old rope. I’ve heard of money for old rope but food from old rope was a new one on me.

Both rats and mice have been known to chew electric wires and have caused both fuses and fires. Mostly, however, they feed at night and pick up scraps of food in houses and in the waste bins, especially in towns close to takeaways.

If we have mice in our houses we have a choice between traps and a cat. I choose a cat because it usually eats its kill and so there is no mess to clean up. The smell of a cat is usually enough to persuade these creatures to move somewhere else!

Bird survey possible without much work

I am one of the lucky ones because of my bird table and I use my binoculars to see into the wood. During the recent frost and snow I watched a great spotted woodpecker drumming against the trunk of a tree smothered in ice. Three years ago I watched the woodpeckers raise a family of four without me having to move from my sitting room.

I have taken part in the RSPB Great Garden Birdwatch without having to work at it. This year a chaffinch sheltered in the woodland and “pinched” food from the bird table along with a nuthatch and a very clumsy wood pigeon.

During the really wintry weather I added Christmas cake and chopped up bacon to the bird table and had three great spotted woodpeckers and a grey squirrel arguing about which came first.

I’m glad that the experts think that birds can be fed all the year round because the visitors really can become residents.