Beautiful days

Hi Sophie, great to hear from you, but no cakes for you to test today!

Hello again everyone, great weather down here, but like everywhere else in the U.K. this week, very cold. We've even taken pity on the chickens, pheasants and peacocks and opened the doors of the barn so that they can have a more sheltered roost, although many of them have snubbed our invitation and continue to fly into the trees at night.

The Fallow Deer, most of which have thick, dark coats at this time of year, look stunning against the white of the frost. The adults have been coming down to be hand fed during the day but the five fawns are still a little stand offish.....until the last couple of days when the young pricket (6 months old) has drummed up the courage to approach the keepers and not run off when fruit is offered; not quite hand feeding yet but his confidence is obviously growing.

The Wallabies, also a bit peckish apparently, have allowed us to get very close to them while we work in the woods. Some of them even seem to be waiting for the banana skins we take for them after our lunch. Seems like a good relationship as they don't seem that interested in the actual bananas.

The cold weather has probably claimed some casualties in the form of the Bengal Eagle Owl eggs. The hen bird has been spending more and more time away from the nest over the last few days and we don't think she will continue to sit; it's just too cold and probably too early. We have increased her food supply to see if it makes any difference but we aren't optimistic.

The Family gave us a little cause for concern by not eating their evening meals last week but it may be that they chose warmth over food as all the adults seem healthy; coats shining glossily in the sunshine as they go about tidying up their holt (again) and chasing away the occasional passing peacock. We haven't seen the cubs for three days (they were 3 weeks old yesterday) because the straw in the holt has been transformed into a dome shape about the size of an upturned bucket. The cubs are probably in the middle of it keeping warm, it's a method we've seem otters use before so we won't intrude unless we think it's really necessary. Zephyr is back to being a picture of health, if it wasn't for the flecks of grey in her coat you'd never guess she was 12 years old last Monday!

William continues to demolish our new pen. A large hole has been excavated by one of the ponds and he can almost disappear completely into it. He's been very playful with Hilda and she continues to respond kindly to him. He still tries to steal her food but she's now more confident and is sticking up for herself - good girl!

We continue to clear the woods and have marked out the shape of the new otter pen (after a couple of trial runs). The stakes will start going in this week if it stays dry.

Our new aviary has now got its' wind proofing in one corner and we continue to work on it whenever time allows; we might even finish it before we open at this rate. Where did I put those perches......?