From Shakespeare to treasured stalking trophies and scientific study, antlers in all their aspects never fail to impress and inspire, says Charles Harris

From the pleasures of harvesting your own one-of-a-kind honey to the meditative calm that methodical hive-management brings, beekeeping has much to offer, finds Jane Wheatley

Remember, remember, watch wildlife in November,

Britain is a country mercifully bereft of threatening fauna–or so you might believe. John Lewis-Stempel provides a miscellany of our otherwise benign land’s more fearsome critters

Unfairly maligned as a sneaky troublemaker, the quicksilver ferret is a characterful, curious and highly intelligent creature–with fascinating regal and cultural trappings to boot, writes Octavia Pollock

In 1993 Sarah and Chris Vermont moved from Brixton, London, to Hungerdowns in Essex, an old farmhouse dating back to 1600 with a Georgian front added in 1757. In the garden there were existing hedges,