If you ask anyone to list the features expected in a typical English village, I am sure they would include a parish church, a shop with or without a post office, a mansion house of some kind, a farm, a village hall, a primary school, perhaps a green or even a pond - and an inn.

It is true, of course, that not every village possesses all of these features for there are many small communities without a church, shop, post office, school or inn and yet this brief list does encompass the general vision of what makes rural life so attractive and appealing.

Somewhat alarmingly, it is surprising how many of those features are now at risk. Churches are closing, shops and post offices are finding it difficult to survive, farms are diversifying or being turned into tourist attractions, mansion houses are more like museums or have been turned into hotels and even some ponds have vanished in recent years. And now, according to recent research, the traditional village inn is at risk.

In the moorland village where I was born and reared there were five inns around the time of World War II. Two of them closed just after the war; two more have either just closed or are about to close which leaves a lone survivor. That seems odd when the village has expanded with more people living there than in the past and with modern transport making it easier to visit even the most remote of inns.

Certainly within the past 30 or 40 years, the village pub has changed almost beyond recognition. I can remember, for example, when it was considered unseemly for a woman to enter a pub, even with a male escort but things started to change quite dramatically when village inns began to serve meals on a regular basis. It began with pickled eggs or sandwiches in the bar, then branched into chicken-and-chips in a basket or scampi before inns developed their cuisine to become more like licensed restaurants. Now, a host of inns offer splendid fare in comfortable and properly equipped dining rooms.

Today, this region boasts some of the finest pubs in England as they offer top quality food in attractive surroundings whilst not losing the essential atmosphere of a village inn. At least two inns close to my home also have delicatessen-type shops as part of the premises and some are expanding with additional sleeping accommodation so that they have become more like small hotels. And yet, we are told, the traditional village inn is at risk.

One reason, it seems, is because our drinking habits have also changed. Many of us will remember when wine was something of a rarity in the average household. Probably the only drink kept in the home was a bottle of sherry or maybe gin or whisky and if the man of the house wanted a drink he would pop down to the pub before eating. Having a pint or two before Sunday lunch was part of our tradition and those drinks were inevitably beer of some kind. Men did not drink wine before meals; indeed, it was not common for men to drink wine at all, except perhaps those with money who lived in large houses with well-stocked cellars.

Our drinking habits are now becoming more like those of our friends across the English Channel. We are drinking more at home, usually with meals and today that drink is not mainly beer - it is wine. Even if we have a meal in a restaurant or pub, the accompanying drinks will often be wine rather than beer.

I can recall the Sixties when it was rather daring for young people to have wine in the house. We would buy unsophisticated stuff like Blue Nun or Black Tower, not really knowing anything about the product and it seems the average consumption of wine in Britain at that time was five bottles per year per person. In the Seventies, we were drinking seven bottles of wine per person per year and this rose to 15 in the Eighties, rising to more than eighteen in the Nineties. Now, the average consumption of wine is 23 bottles per person per year in Britain. But averages can be deceptive - it means some of us are drinking quite a lot while others never touch it!

In noting this change to our drinking habits, it coincides with the trend of having more drinks of a greater variety in the home, usually to be consumed with meals and the outcome is that we tend not to pop down to the pub for a pint before meals. If we do pop down to the pub nowadays, it is usually to enjoy a meal, either a bar snack or a restaurant meal, and in that case the accompanying drink is often wine. But whether wine will ever oust beer as our national drink remains doubtful.

Although we reminisce about the atmosphere of a typical village inn, with its bar full of local characters putting the world and its politicians right, it appears that this really is a fading dream. Somehow, it will not be the same if those characters sit around sipping wine, even if that is how it's done on the continent.

A tragedy occurred recently on the route of my morning walk. A young badger was struck by a passing vehicle and was left on the side of the road where it evidently died from head wounds. I found it next morning.

It was lying on the path taken by several badgers as they head for drinking water during the hours of darkness. Badgers repeatedly use the same path for these excursions but as they are rather slow-moving creatures, they are always at risk from passing traffic. This is not the only badger to die hereabouts in this way and most certainly, it will not be the last.

The question was what to do with the corpse. It was lying at the side of the carriageway on a tarmac surface and so I decided to move it into the shelter of an adjoining woodland, there for nature to take its course. A dead creature means the gift of food for a variety of birds, animals and insects, and after all, that is what would happen if the badger had died a natural death.

In doing this, I was reminded of that peculiar creature, the sexton beetle. I doubt if these undertakers of the animal world could actually cope with something the size of a badger, although they will tackle the bodies of dead mice or small birds. Just over half in inch long, sexton beetles are easily identified by their black and orange body markings and it is said they can smell a dead body from two miles away.

The name is very apt for it is also known as the grave-digging beetle or burying beetle as it provides a service by burying carcases. A pair of these beetles will locate a corpse and then dig a hole beneath it. They then drag the remains into the hole, removing the skin in the process, and bury it. The female then lays her eggs near the body and remains on guard against predators until they hatch.

The young sexton larvae are fed with partially digested food but as they mature, they are fed from the nearby carcase. The parents will also destroy any maggots on the carcase, to prevent them destroying it.

Whether or not sexton beetles will tackle that badger carcase may depend upon the weather. They are generally seen from early spring until late in the summer, and our autumn weather may not be to their liking. But if they do not deal with that unfortunate badger's remains, the task will fall upon some other scavenger.

We must not forget that this coming weekend heralds the celebration of Hallowe'en on October 31. In recent years, this has witnessed a revival if only because children now dress up as witches and warlocks while some cause problems making mischief. Mischief Night used to be the eve before Bonfire Night and although it was supposed to be a time when youngsters performed acts of minor mischief, it developed into an excuse for vandalism and damage. It also spawned Trick or Treat which became another excuse for trouble. So many of our folk customs have been lost, abandoned or halted for that reason. It is sad that some of our youngsters are unable to enjoy themselves without causing problems.

Symptomatic of this is the news that a pumpkin grower has had to guard his crop against rustlers. During one night alone, he lost about 25 plump pumpkins worth around £150 when thieves stole them, undoubtedly for re-sale and eventual use at Hallowe'en