Funds for shops/transport: The Countryside Agency is to throw two lifelines to small rural communities, one to help shops, pubs and churches, a second to boost local transport.

There will be £20 million in grants to improve or re-open village shops, to extend pubs to provide community facilities like meeting rooms, to set up Internet access points, and many other activities involving churches and training schemes.

Another £15 million will be available to local communities to improve transport in any way they feel best, from buying cars, mini-buses or even mo-peds, or setting up vouchers schemes will local bus or taxi operators.

Communities interested in applying for grants should telephone 0870 333 0170. More information will be available from April on the agency's website www.countryside.gov.uk

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Stately 21st Century? Plans for the building of a brand-new stately home on a 700-acre estate in Hampshire have caused much controversy, with many countryside users aghast. However, the Yorkshire branch of the Country Landowners' Association thinks it's a good idea.

Says CLA regional director Dorothy Fairburn: "Now with the rural economy needing a boost, there is an opportunity to re-create the great country houses of the 18th and 19th Centuries…the fact is that the countryside must be more welcoming to new money."

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And finally, remember Prickles: As the weather warms up, hedgehogs will soon becoming out of hibernation - and facing the most dangerous time of the year. The British Hedgehog Preservation Society is appealing to gardeners and motorists to keep a keen eye out for the little beasties.

Strimmers are particularly lethal for still-drowsy hedgehogs and rural roads are a death trap: this is the time when Prickle's a'courting goes and in his urge to find a mate, his road sense gets particularly blurred!