What are the most interesting wildlife that you've seen in YOUR HOUSE? (3 Viewers)

[kb57]

I used to live in an old terraced cottage with coal fires - the bedroom had its own fireplace and chimney. One morning my ex-wife and I were woken up to a western jackdaw flapping around the room, distributing black soot everywhere. We'd had a cowl fitted to the main chimney, as otherwise they'd just drop sticks down until it was completely blocked in an attempt to build a nest.
We upgraded to a newer house and I dug a pond - one day we had two male southern hawker dragonflies which were involved in a territorial dispute chasing each other around the living room.
On our travels, best we had was a common kingfisher fly into a houseboat on the Dal Lake, Kashmir, and perch on the arm of the chintzy sofa right in front of us, before flying off again. Perhaps less welcome was another chimney-borne visitor, in Haputale, Sri Lanka - what I'm fairly certain was a black rat scurried around on the hearth or a while, then disappeared back into the fireplace. I believe this is my only sighting of black rat though, so in terms of bird and mammal ticks it's more significant than the kingfisher .

 

[kb57]

Well, there is the occasional elephant in the room but one of the most exiting animals i had in my house was a scorpion in my boot when i lived in Crete.

My adoptive dad was in the Libyan desert in WW2, and his advice to me before I went travelling to the Middle East was always to shake my boots out before I put them on.
I'm going to Crete shortly myself, so your post is a timely reminder to heed his advice!

 

[emc]

A long time ago I opened the basement door and out flew a large black bird (black color, don't know what sort of bird it was), I chased it around the house before I was able to corner it and let it out the balcony door. I suspect the bird got into the basement by falling down the chimney. In my younger years I used to train squirrels to come into the house and help themselves to a bowl of nuts, one squirrel came in through the front door, walked down the stairs into the family room, grabbed a nut and went out the back door.