Hut 3

 

Pine marten

Some of our badger clan

Mrs Fox

Badger at hut 2

The newest feeding station

Hutting - what is it?

Hut 3

Hutting is literally about living off-grid in a hut. It is camping out in a sustainably built, wooden hut but with the addition of a few home comforts like a comfy armchair, a log burner for the colder nights and space to cook, wash and live a little while enjoying your recreational time. It's like time spent in a cabin in the woods. You are surrounded by nature and the wildlife that inhabits the area. Frugaldom has three recreational huts and countless opportunities for Friends of Frugaldom who help support the project by sharing the running costs. Frugaldom is not for profit, it is run entirely voluntarily. We are always looking for like-minded individuals to come along and join our mini community for a few days or weeks, to make the most of holidays and weekends, either in campervans/motorhomes of by staying in the huts. To support this fantastic project, check out our 'Happy Hutters' option in the membership tiers at our www.ko-fi.com/Frugaldom site and sign up from as little as £5 per month. Or, simply send us a donation and we will spend it on food for the sanctuary anumals and wildlife. :)

For our Bay 1 Visitors of 11 July 2024

 

Pine Marten

Pine marten

Fox cub

Fox cub

Badger

Badger

Badger cub

Badger cub

Fox cub

Socks, one of the feral cats

After a bit of a late start, the wildlife visitors began arriving around 11.30pm with visits to Bay 1 feeding station from the pine marten, badger, badger cub, fox and fox cub. Visitors staying at the campervan /motorhome aire are welcome to bring along their own trail cameras, eggs, cat or dog food, peanuts, wild bird food to put out for our day and night wildlife but please do not feed any of the sanctuary ponies of goat as all are on monitored diets for various health reasons.

To join our support group, which costs from as little as £5 per month and contributes towards the feed costs here, you can sign up via our page at www.ko-fi.com/Frugaldom

Once again, many thanks for following our blog and supporting our voluntary project. You can find Frugaldom on Facebook, Twitter/X, Instagram, YouTube and Google.

To book a wildlife watch parking spot at Frugaldom in your campervan or motorhome, email frugaldom@gmail.com or text / WhatsApp 07795870688 or via any of the messaging options on the various pages. We cannot guarantee mobile signal so can't always respond to calls or immediately to messages.

Badger Haven at Frugaldom

Our badger clan is growing

 

Frugaldom did not set out to become a haven for the local badger clan, it happened quite by mistake. Our barren land was purchased 10 years ago and from them until now, we have been planting rees, hedges, wildflowers, herbs, grasses, fruit, berries and vegetables. The badger clan found us just last year, when we first completed the hutting project and began monitoring wildlife.

Badger in daylight

We did some fundraising for Frugaldom to help cover the cost of some trail cameras, which we managed to source for around £25 each. These were initially purchased to monitor the movements of a pine marten that was spotted.

Pine marten

By setting up the various cameras we were able to establish regular surveillance and have now amassed housands of photos and video clips showing weasels, stoats, pine marten, badger, deer, fox, adders and to our surprise, 5 feral cats who visit through the night. 

Over the winter of 2023/24 we began offering wildlife watch weekends for Friends of Frugaldom, staying either in the huts or in campervans or motorhomes in the yard. As a Certificated (or Certified) Location, we are licensed for up to 5 fully-contained campervans but we aim to keep this to a maximum of 3 owing to quiet hours and lack of services. We do have a waste tank for emptying portable toilet cassettes and a soakaway for water but we are fully off-grid here, so no electricity, sewers or running water. It is very much a case of bring absolutely everything you need, take nothing but photographs and leave no trace. We charge £5 for using the basic facilities and overnight parking is by donation. You must like animals and wildlife and you must adhere to our fairly lengthy list of rules as we are a sanctuary and wildlife conservation project carrying out wildlife surveillance seven night per week. Although we don't object to people bringing their pets in motorhomes or campervans, the pets MUST be kept on short leads and all mess cleaned up. Badgers, pine martens and adders don't mix well with domestic pets if they inadvertently get cornered. Ordinarily, though, the wildlife is out after dark and happily wandering around when left to do their own thing.

Pair of badgers in the paddock by hut 1

Our various feeding stations are topped up each evening before dark. We don't expect our visitors to be out wandering around after dark as we are simply a stopover, not a campsite or holiday park. Here at Frugaldom, the animals come first and our primary function is as a nature and wildlife conservatin project with an animal sanctuary. We currently have 8 ponies and a goat - Vincent Van Goat - to look after. All funds raised from our visitors contribute towards the care of the animals and wildlife.

Badger cubs

We have at least 2 female badgers in the clan who currently have cubs. (Our visiting fox seems to have just a single cub.) The cubs have just begun to come out at nights, often seen in the paddock or creating merry mayhem on the deckings of huts 2 or 3, where we have badger box feeders. These have been a great addition to the project, allowing our happy hutters the opportunity to sit watching the badgers feeding outside the hut windows.

Some of the badger clan

If you are planning a stopover at Frugaldom, we recommend you bring along some peanuts. Everything here seems to love peanuts, even the goat and old Ginger, our thirty-something year old retired pony. We may not be posh or fancy, we may not have modern conveniences and we may not be to everyone's taste as an overnight location but we do this out of a love for nature and justice for abandoned and abused ponies. If we can raise a few pounds to help provide them all with a little safe haven then you are all welcome to join us in our quest to achieve this on a frugal budget. The following are some helpful links:

CONTACT DETAILS, LISTS AND LINKS

Contact details and other information, including social media, Amazon Wish List, Ko-fi break updates, website and fundraising links.

Address: Frugaldom, Kirkcowan, Newton Stewart, Dumfries & Galloway, DG8 0ET

Tel/WhatsApp: 07795 870688

What3Words///Photo.Regal.Fencing

Social media, most places, username is @Frugaldom

www.instagram.com/frugaldom

www.twitter.com/frugaldom

www.youtube.com/@frugaldom

Become Friends of Frugaldom: www.ko-fi.com/Frugaldom

GoFundMe page: https://gofund.me/b56f6009

PayPal.me/frugaldom or email frugaldom@gmail.com

Amazon Wishlist: https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/29CPYAW8MPZ3F

Web address: www.frugaldom.com leads to this blog, which is http://frugaldom.blogspot.com/

THANK YOU TO ALL WHO SUPPORT OUR PROJECT

Baby badger lands on his head and then gets told off by parent

This Frugaldom Corner of Scotland

Rescued foals

In 2020, with the COVID lockdowns hanging heavy over all of us, we struggled along, devoid of volunteers, gainful employment (or self-employment) and with support at an all time low. Several friends lost their jobs, their businesses and their loved ones. Times were pretty grim. We had just taken in 5 emergency rehomings late 2019 - a Shetland pony, plus 4 colt foals that had been part of a large rescue operation in South Wales.

We survived 2020 and then into 2021. With the support of a few vanlifers and a planning exemption certificate from Dumfries & Galloway Council allowing us to charge £5 per night for visiting campervans and motorhomes, we made it through 2021, having rehomed the Shetland pony but gained a laminitic retiree. Estimated costs of keeping a pony here average £1,000 per year and £10,000 is a huge amount to pay out just on feed, bedding and hoofcare. We are lucky in that we have no rent, mortgage or other debts to service so as long as the animals are fed, we are fine. 

Yard parking

When the council exemption certificate ended, we decided to continue with our 'aire', the certification transferring to the organisation called 'MotorhomeFun'. We remain licensed for up to 5 campervans, only now it is through CAMpRA Rally. 

We remain at £5 per night for stopovers. We are still off-grid with no services other than a soakaway for waste tap water and a tank for emptying cassettes from portable toilets. We are still devoid of visitors, volunteers or supporters most of the time, despite being listed in many of the relevant sites, directories and mobile apps. This makes us a great hideaway for anyone travelling around our part of southwest Scotland. 

 

A holiday park or campsite is something we will never become but if you love wildlife and nature, plus ponies and the odd goat, you are welcome to stop in for a visit, park up, stay a night, a weekend, a week or a fortnight. Just remember that all you get for £5 per night is a safe place to park and a memory of Frugaldom. We recommend you bring peanuts, eggs and apples for the pine marten and badger clan. some dog food for the fox or cat food for the feral cats. Alternatively, you could bring carrots, apples, celery or bananas for the ponies and goat.