Which surprising animals are scrapping over leftovers?
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Who do you think would win in a fight?
Have you ever heard loud animalistic shrieks or squeals coming from yours or your neighbour's gardens?
Well a new study has suggested it could be animals scrapping over scraps!
Experts at Nottingham Trent University and the University of Brighton have studied hours of footage of badgers, hedgehogs, foxes and cats fighting over leftover food in British urban gardens.
The researchers found that different animals competed over the scraps, often showing aggressive behaviours like lunging, biting and striking out.
They analysed hundreds of videos recorded by members of the public in their own back gardens and investigated interactions between species.
Known to have a snappy side to them, badgers were the most dominant in the garden gladiator arena, but the typically shy and quiet hedgehogs had more clashes than expected!
Badgers don't usually pick fights with their own kind
From 316 situations where animals were spotted together, 175 ended in some form of showdown.
The researchers found that creatures were more likely to square up to different species than their own.
Despite what you see in cartoons, cats and foxes appear to really not like each other.
More than three-quarters of interactions (77%) sparked some form of aggressive or defensive reaction, with cats usually coming out on top.
Foxes are expert scavengers
But the team were surprised to notice that feisty felines were very often dominated by - no not dogs - but hedgehogs!
They suggested this could be because pet cats are not as well adapted to defend themselves against the hedgehog's best defence mechanism - their spines.
If you decide to leave food out for animals, be cautious and never try to make them tame or hand-feed them.
Don't put out too much food, as they won't move far if they can find all the food they need in one place.
RSPCA advice
It's not just cats that are victim to the hedgehog's aggression.
They were noted for frequently turning on their own kind with more than half (55%) of interactions between two hedgehogs leading to some form of aggression.
Hedgehogs perform an attack move the scientists named the "barge and roll".
One hedgehog would attacks another by running at it, causing the victim to roll up before being pushed away by the assailant.
In one instance an individual was pushed down a flight of concrete steps, and another into water!
The study showed that badgers were stronger than all other species in the contest for food but rarely picked fights with other badgers - only 7% of badger on badger interactions resulted in fights.
They found that while food left by people in urban gardens can provide benefits for wild animals, but can also draw competitors and predators close together resulting in conflict.