End of open season update.

We've closed again after a very busy half term. Usually we allow visitors to hand feed the Fallow Deer but we had to withdraw food from sale in the last week of October because they had decided it was time for their rut. Fallow are normally quite shy but can be a bit of a handful at this time of year. Anyway, the bucks managed to sort the pecking order out without too much of a kerfuffle (one broken antler is all) and now the herd is back to being one big happy family, and hopefully some of the does are with fawn.

Lottie (Harriet and Tam's cub) is doing very well and might be developing a bit of "attitude". She is very pushy (like her mum) and has taken to stealing her dad's food without fear of any retribution (because mum is on hand). She tries the same thing on with the keepers too and usually gets away with it (same reason). The three of them get on well (unless food is involved) and, apart from digging a huge hole and managing to collapse a 9 foot section of concreted water way, are well behaved.

Cinnamon and Leap continue to do well, although I do sometimes question their hunting skills. I have seen both of these otters hunt successfully, but the other day, after a large meal, they were rolling around in the water together when a drake landed in their pen. They gave chase, caught it quickly, and then let it go whilst they played with each other. The drake seized his chance and tried to make off, but as soon as he legged it they chased and caught him again, but, as before as soon as he was captured the two otters lost interest and started to play with each other. This happened once more before the duck worked out how how to escape from the two playful predators (i.e do it quietly and slowly) and flew off, apparently unscathed.

Biggy, Smalley, Tor and Libby are still all living together. Libby is exceptionally shy and needs very careful handling. It might be that Libby is the first agoraphobic otter that we have ever encountered; we are trying various strategies to overcome this and we are having some but not complete success. Tor is still stupidly cute but scarily strong. the other night (yes, in the dark) I was pottering around in their pen when he jumped onto my lap and started opening and closing his mouth very gently ("play with me") I took my cue and found his "octy" (a toy octopus he's had since he lived at home with us) and gave him a bit of a roll around with it and once he was satisfied that we were still close friends he let me get on with what I was doing. He is very strong, he isn't at all aggressive but I do worry that he might make a mistake that involves my fingers and his teeth......

Dasher our tame Muntjac continues to be the major criminal at the Otter Park; holding up members of staff for monkey nuts, squeezing through the barn door to burgle various food bins, and worst of all stalking staff until he gets his grapes!!

We are fighting the weather (has it been raining?) whilst we get on with winter maintenance and a brand new pen for some exciting new arrivals in the near future.

Overall things look very good considering the appalling weather; we've only lost a dozen or so large trees (time to sharpen the chainsaws) and a small landslip here and there. Lets hope it dries up soon.

Autumn arrives

The weeks have flown by again so time for an update. Tor is doing really well; we had initially tried to get him accepted by our other hand reared otters as we had not been able to find him a play mate elsewhere in the country and he needed to have an otter to socialise with. One of the keepers would take Tor into the pen and supervise the introductions; Biggy and Smalley are so accepting and inquisitive and tried to play with him almost straight away. Cinnamon and Leap just ignored him and kept their distance. After several days of Tor being taken into the pen with a keeper to supervise the introductions Leap decided he was not acceptable and attacked him just a warning but enough for us to know it was not going to work out.

Plan B then was to separate Biggy and Smalley from Cinnamon and Leap as this would have to be done in the near future and house Tor with Biggy and Smalley. Tor moved into the pen first and Biggy and Smalley came a little quicker than anticipated! John put the box into the pen for them to explore and get used to before we caught them up but they were straight in so they were moved there and then!!

They have all settled well and do not appear to miss each other which is good as they have all been together since such a young age. Cinnamon and Leap still share a box at night and by the second morning Tor, Biggy and Smalley were all sharing the same box at night too. Tor has grown in confidence over the weeks and now he comes out for the feeds and the three otters played really well together so mission accomplished!

On 27^th August however we had another abandoned British Otter brought into us, Libby was very dehydrated, stressed, had an abscess on his hind leg and a badly damaged toe on his front left foot which meant he walked with a bad limp. On a good note his lab results came back clear which meant once he had been treated for the injuries and was feeding well he could mix with Biggy’s group. Libby was only about seven weeks old so still needed milk and was very aggressive towards the keepers so we wanted him to integrate with Biggy’s group as soon as possible. He is living in the pen with them now but is very reluctant to come out when the public are around but will sleep with the other otters. We hope that his confidence will continue to grow as time passes.

Harriet’s cub is nine weeks old now and has been spotted outside this week and even seen learning to swim with Harriet which is fantastic. Tamarisk is still kept firmly in his place but we hope as the weeks pass now he will be allowed to join in!

Carmen, Coady and Kernow are still thriving and have adapted well to not having Tino around, he went off site to take part in a breeding programme with one of our females, Jill in August.

William, Hilda and Pluto are a joy to watch when they are outside playing together. Pluto definitely takes after his Mother and is very vocal and pushy when it comes to food!

Our two young Bucks are getting more confident as the days pass and we are watching to see which one becomes the more dominant male. Little Dasher can still be seen around the centre and will stop to be made a fuss of and eat from your hand and has been spotted in the gift shop on several occasions last week!!

The weather has been delightful for September and our visitors are enjoying the warm weather. The leaves are starting to turn orange and brown, a sure sign that the open season is drawing to an end and that autumn is arriving.

Gold CHEFS Award for Mandy and Lin, cub for Harriet.

On Monday 27th July at about 12.45pm Harriet gave birth to a single cub. She took us by surprise, giving no warning at all; we actually thought she and Tamarisk weren't getting on too well but that just shows how wrong we were! We don't interefere with British Otter cubs unless we have to so we don't know the sex of the new baby. It is four weeks old tomorrow and doing well. It has begun to change colour from silver to brown, starting at the head and gradually working backwards along the body. If all goes well its' eyes will open a week tomorrow and it will start exploring shortly afterwards.

On a subject very close to my heart (and to be honest, stomach) our tea room has been awarded a Gold CHEFS Award from Cornwall Council. This is in recognition of high standards of cleanliness, training, and use of healthy, local produce. We are one of the first tea rooms to receive the award (only two gold awards have been awarded so far in Cornwall since the new unitary authority took over). Mandy and Lin have worked extremely hard over the past few years to update and improve the tea room and we are very proud of them.

Hansel

Hansel's antlers continued to give him trouble in the days following his accident. We expected them to fall off quite quickly but it soon became clear that that was not going to happen. On Tuesday we examined him and it was clear that his condition was very grave indeed; he hadn't broken the actual antlers but the pedicle below them (the pedicle is the part of his skull that supports the antlers).

He was put down later that evening.

We will miss this mischievious, handsome buck very much indeed.

New arrivals

Firstly I would like to say thank you to the children of Coads Green Primary School who have named Carmen’s cubs for us. The smaller of the two (a female?) will be called Coady and the larger one (a male?) will be called Kernow. I’ve just been trying the names out with the cubs and they seem to like them already.

Since last writing (too long I know) we have had several new arrivals; two new Fallow Deer fawns, one now three weeks old and the other only a few days. Both are doing very well.

The same cannot be said for their father, Hansel. He has been growing what looked like a superb set of antlers although they were less than half grown and still covered in velvet. Alas no longer; on Saturday night he seems to have tried them out on something a lot bigger and tougher than his antlers were (at the early stages of growth antlers are quite fragile and only become useful weapons when the velvet has dropped off and the bone has had a chance to dry out). The result is that he has badly damaged both of them and they now dangle around the sides of his head and make him look like a miniature moose. They may now dry up and drop off or continue to grow in a deformed shape, we’ll have to wait and see. It’s not uncommon for young bucks to do this and they soon learn not to mess with their antlers until they are properly grown. Hopefully he has learnt his lesson.

Sonny (one of our Asian Short Clawed bitches) continues to put on weight and appear pregnant but as yet no babies have appeared. She is eleven years old and we are a bit worried that this, being her first (and rather surprising) pregnancy, will be complicated. We are watching her carefully and crossing our fingers for her.

On Friday 26^th June we took a phone call early in the morning; a British Otter cub had been found a few miles from us near a village called Week St. Mary. We went to see what we could do and when we arrived saw a very small, thin and sorry looking little male cub. His eyes were full of dried mucus and barely open. We guessed his age at just over 5 weeks. We had taken our first aid kit with us and gave him some fluids there and then. His eyes immediately began to weep and in less than a minute he was able to open them properly and look back at us with deep blue, frightened eyes. He was down but not out.

Tor, as we have named him, was obviously dehydrated and took fluids readily. He had been found high on a hill with no obvious water course nearby and no explanation as to why he was there.

We took him home and weighed him, 700 grams, a real lightweight. Over the next few days his life really did hang in the balance. Visits to the vet confirmed he had various infections and muscular difficulties on his right side. He was fed from a syringe every hour and a half, day and night. Some days were good and some bad as his body fought for survival.

Twelve days after taking him in he appeared a little brighter than usual and since then he has forged ahead really well. He still has some problems to overcome and he isn’t out of the woods yet but we are beginning to get just the tiniest bit more optimistic. Weaning has begun and that means much longer periods between feeds (thank goodness). We have also introduced him to water which he seems to like as long as it’s nice and warm and only an inch deep. He might be an otter but he’s certainly not very aquatic yet!

Thanks to Nicola and Richard for finding Tor and doing something about it in time to save him.

The Royal Cornwall Show

When Mandy and I took over this park in 2006 some of our friends thought we were going mad as it was such a change to our previous way of life. Perhaps they were right and maybe we're going even madder because a few weeks ago we were invited to take some of our otters to the Royal Cornwall Show, a huge three day event with all sorts of country pursuits and activities going on.

We were provided with a tent only 30 yards from a beautiful fishing lake in the Countryside area along with an outside area in which to build a portable pen.

Barry, one of our keepers, and I spent some time designing and building a portable pen that would keep the otters in and people, dogs etc. out. A few days before the event we went to the site and built the pen, which included a large bath for the otters to plunge in as they wanted.

Mandy and I had already chosen the otters who were to accompany us; Biggy and Smalley, because of their bold nature. Taking British Otters to a show like this might be too much for them, with all the noises and sights. British Otters also need an awful lot more security as they are much bigger and more athletic than their Asian cousins.

On the Wednesday evening before the show we arrived on site with our boys. We showed them round and let them have a little swim before putting them to bed at 10pm. They were good as gold. Straight to sleep and no going to the loo in the night (much appreciated when we were sleeping only 2 feet from them). They woke up at 630am and were bright and confident. 

They spent all day playing with a keeper, sleeping on a keeper or getting a keeper as wet as could be.

They took no time at all to get used to the hubbub of the show, the shooting, the horses and cattle moving around and the tannoy descriptions of the various events that went on from dawn 'til dusk.

By evening they were quite tired so we put them to bed early and they slept through just like the night before. 

When they had been young they had been toilet trained, we didn't expect them to remember it but to our amazement they did! Just one small accident in nearly four full days.

Their good behaviour continued throughout and they were the stars of the show (in my opinion anyway). 

On the Saturday evening we returned with them to the park and reintroduced them to Leap and Cinnamon. This can be tricky as even after short absences some otters don't seem to recognise one another but not in this case. They seemed genuinely pleased to see each other and were all soon rolling gently with on another in the water, even ignoring the food we had taken down for them.

All in all it was a great experience for us, and them too. The seemed to enjoy the change and the additional attention. The only real drawback was that they didn't have an otter policy in the beer tent so we couldn't take them in (joking!).

All of the otters here are fine. Carmen's cub are a joy to watch now that they can swim well and are confident enough to come out when the public are there.

We have been less succesful with our birds of prey though with no chicks as yet from any of them although some are still sitting.

Its all go so I'd better get back to it while its light.

Thanks to all who helped us at the Royal Cornwall and hope to see some of you at the Launceston Show if all goes to plan.

May already?

Well it’s May already and I don’t know where the last few weeks have gone we’ve been so busy.

 

Firstly Carmen; everything is fine with her, the cubs and Tino. The cubs are now just over ten weeks old and are getting to be reasonably good swimmers. We saw one of their first lessons about 10 days ago and it went something like this: Carmen emerged from the holt with one cub and they made their way to the waters edge. Carmen slipped gently into the water but the cub wouldn’t follow. She called quietly to it, rolled onto her side and gently tried to encourage it into the water but the cub wouldn’t budge. Time for a change of tack and Carmen decided to grab the cub by its ear and drag it into the water. The cub panicked and was splashing a lot with its front paws in a poor effort at a doggy paddle and headed straight back to the bank. Carmen positioned herself between the cub and the bank and each time it got close she dragged it back into deeper water. After about 2 minutes the cub was exhausted and its coat was waterlogged; it gave up and began to sink into the water. But ever attentive mum slipped under the water and emerged with the cub clinging to her back. She swam around like this for a minute and then took her baby to the bank where the poor bedraggled little thing made for the holt. This was then repeated with the second cub.

 

Thankfully since then things have improved and we see Carmen swimming with one cub several times a day but we haven’t yet seen her with both cubs in the water at the same time. Tino is taking all this in his stride. He doesn’t take part in any swimming lessons as far as we know but we have seen him playing with his cubs in a very gentle and caring way. Mind you, with Carmen around he wouldn’t do anything else would he?

 

It’s good news all round at the moment with our birds of prey. Firstly the Little Owls and the Kestrels. Both are fairly new additions to the park and have obviously decided they like it here, as both pairs of birds have laid eggs in the last couple weeks. The Little Owl was the first to lay, but seemed to be a bit confused about what she should do once she had laid an egg. She laid her egg in one box and then started sitting in another box. We decided to help her out and moved the egg underneath her, but she pushed it in front of her and refused point blank to sit on it, so we took the egg out and have put it in the incubator to see what will become of it. It may be that she’s very intelligent and knows the egg won’t hatch or that there is something wrong with it, so has decided not to waste any energy sitting. We will just have to wait and see. Since the first egg she has laid a second and for the moment we are leaving it with her to see if she will look after it herself.

 

The Kestrels have also laid two eggs. We went and fed them yesterday and the female hadn’t been out flying around as she usually is in the day, so we had a check around the aviary to make sure she was okay and she was sitting on two bright orange eggs. She seems to know what she is doing and has been getting off the nest to get some food and then straight back on it, so hopefully we will have some new chicks in the next few weeks.

 

Along with the Little owls and Kestrels a couple of our longer term residents have also started laying eggs, the Bengal Eagle Owls and the Snowy Owls.

 

The Snowy Owls have had bad luck with their chick rearing in the past, the main reason being that the female seems to find her offspring very tasty! Last year they had three eggs and sure enough mum ate all three. We have now learnt from our mistakes and formed a plan of action for them. Basically, when the first egg hatches we are going to try and rear it ourselves and see if the Snowy Owl will rear any that are left. That way hopefully we will have some survivors. So far this year she has laid five eggs, the first two ended up in a puddle after some heavy rain and she decided to leave them, so we have put the eggs into our incubator,
(but we’re not very hopeful), then the third egg she laid in a scrape right at the front of her aviary, at the most downhill point she could get, so we took it away for fear of another drowned scrape. She has now laid two more eggs at the highest point in her aviary and is sitting on them. We are bit more hopeful about these and it would seem that they are looking after them very well, as last night we saw for the first time the male sitting on the nest whilst the female got off to get some food. Fingers crossed!

 

Lastly we have the Bengal Eagle Owls who are sitting on two eggs, she has laid eggs in the winter but then leaves them and they go cold. So far she has been sitting on these for a week or two now, so hopefully something will happen here as well.

 

All of our animals seem to be having a baby boomer of a year, as well as the owls, we have lots of ducklings at the moment. Most of our eggs in the incubator have hatched this year. We let six of our bigger ducklings out into the rest of the park last week, they seem to have found their way round fairly well but still like the company of the other ducklings, as they tend to hang around their old duck run in the mornings and evenings. We have another twelve ducklings inside that are still a bit too small to go outside and a few eggs left to hatch in the incubator.

 

Outside we have a Muscovy duck with thirteen ducklings, they don’t all appear to be hers, we think she has some Mallards and Aylesburys as well and was obviously so good at sitting on the nest, the other ducks have decided to let her be super mum and look after all of them.

 

Some of our geese seem to be getting into the spirit of things as well. Our Barnacle geese are sitting on the island and for the last couple of years have had two successful clutches.

 

Unfortunately our Chinese Fawn Goose has decided to copy the Barnacle Geese and would like some babies of her own. She made a beautiful nest and sat for a very long time, so we thought something exciting would happen. However, as time went on and nothing was happening we decided to go and have a look ourselves. We found one egg, which had been there so long and it was rotten, so we threw that one away and hoped she would resume normal life, as she has been so good, she hadn’t been coming off her nest for any food or anything. However, she still persists in sitting on her nest, but now gets off every morning and evening for food. Whether or not she has laid any more eggs we don’t know, but time will tell.

 

As well as birds we have seen some young Muntjac deer running around. We have one that looks a few months old and another one that is living with mum and dad behind that barn that looks only a few weeks old, as it still has all of its spots.

 

Dasher our hand reared Muntjac fawn has been let out into the park, after he had a run in with his aviary and received a couple of small cuts. We then decided to let him run around the rest of the park and would try calling him for his milk in the mornings and evenings. It does work, he now tends to have his milk once a day but as soon as he hears the word milk he appears right by your side. He seems to be integrating very well with the other deer and has made good friends with the youngest Muntjac that we have seen, as they running around, playing together the other day.

 

That’s all for now,

 

 

Carmen- a quick update

Carmen's twin cubs are now 5 and a half weeks old and doing very well. They opened their eyes last Sunday at 37 days old; a couple of days late but none the worse for it. She appears to have a minor problem with lactation again and looks a little swollen but for the moment we have decided not to interfere. Remember, we open tomorrow but you won't see these cubs for a little while yet as they are shy and will probably only come when its very quiet.

Carmen update

During the last week Carmen has been in a very aggressive and protective state of mind. poor Tino has been very patient and though he has been attacked a number of times he has never retaliated. On more than occasion Carmen has been seen in the water with a cub in her mouth or between her legs. The water is very cold (I speak from experience) and the cubs aren't anywhere near being able to cope with it. Whether she is a poor mum or is trying to wash or cool her babies we don't yet know.

However, in the last two or three days Carmen has been much more like her old self and certainly much more relaxed than of late; this morning (Tuesday 24th March) she was so relaxed that I was able to get a quick peek into her holt and see what was in there. Two healthy looking cubs that's what!

Carmen seems to be getting the hang of things, the cubs are four weeks and four days old today. Their eyes should be open by this weekend

More new arrivals

Well its taken several years and there have been some false starts but at last Carmen has had a litter of cubs and is taking good care of them.

Carmen has had litters before but none of her cubs has ever lived beyond three days but on Friday 20th February at tea time she gave birth to at least two cubs and today they are 3 weeks and two days old and we are really hopeful that she will continue to care for them.

After previous births Carmen became distressed and moved her cubs from one location to another, often through water, resulting in their death. The cause of the distress was not easy to identify and may have had multiple causes.

This time we decided on a different approach; first of all we introduced her to a new mate, Tino, an unproven male, in November 2008. He has a rather pushy character and is quite a contrast to Carmen, who can be quite retiring. We then gave them separate holts some distance apart so that they could get away from each other easily and left them to their own devices.
When we thought that Carmen was pregnant we decided to leave Tino in the same enclosure, a tactic that has worked before with William and Hilda (and resulted in the birth of Pluto in October last year). Normally we would remove the dog otter prior to birth so that his presence doesn't upset the expectant mother.

Carmen seems to be reassured by Tino's presence. She often seeks him out and if she can't find him she will pop her head into his holt and whistle for him (four sharp blasts usually!) and out he comes. They greet each other with a few sniffs and a quick play and once she is happy that he is there she goes about the business of feeding etc. Once or twice since the birth he has ventured a little too close to her holt while she has been some distance away resulting in a fiery but brief attack from her. He hasn't suffered any visible injuries so far because she doesn't drive her attack home, its more a defensive display to remind him to keep his distance unless she is there right beside him. When she is with him he has been seen looking into her holt and hasn't received any rebuke so it appears that he can approach with permission and under escort. Tino has become very subordinate and we haven't seen any aggressive behaviour from him at all.

On Saturday 14th March we did have a few nervous moments when Carmen was seen carrying one cub around the pen with another in her tunnel. She was obviously agitated but after a few minutes she returned them to the holt. That's the only time we had seen the cubs since the afternoon they were born. We are still worried about upsetting Carmen and are giving her a wide berth whenever possible. Although we haven't seen the cubs we know they are still there because we can hear them. We sometimes use a small radio transmitter strapped to the holt to eavesdrop on new mothers but there's no need for that in this case because the cubs scream like mad when Carmen feeds or toilets them.

The next two weeks are very important; if the cubs get to five weeks old and their eyes open they have a good chance of survival in the longer term, so fingers (and everything else) crossed.

Pluto continues to be the cutest thing ever; I've just seen William (his dad) lying on his back and Pluto lying on top of him attacking him playfully. Magic.

On a sad note Zephyr, our Asian Short Clawed Otter and head of the Family group, died in her sleep last Tuesday. She was 13 years and 4 months old and is sadly missed.

The snow arrives in Cornwall!

Like most of the country this week we have had snow, it makes the journey to work a challenge but we obviously have to get in to feed and care for the animals.
It looks beautiful but not all the animals are fond of it, the British Otters love the snow and ice and enjoy rolling around in it and swimming in the freezing water. The Asian Short Clawed otters are not as keen and seem to get back inside as soon as they have finished their food. The hand reared cubs enjoyed the snowballs we made for them but again Biggy and Smalley not as keen with Biggy wanting to be picked up off the snow for a warm cuddle!

We have had a few more surprises this week we were amazed to see a young Joey in its mothers pouch looking out onto the freezing world around him. It’s definitely in the best place in these conditions.

On Thursday the snow had disappeared so we prepared to catch up on some of the jobs that the weather had disrupted. On the routine morning inspection I came across a large carp in the waterway at the edge of the waterfowl lake. On closer inspection it had been recently killed and I think I disturbed the diner, certainly must have been quite a large animal to catch it and drag it out of the water!
We gave it to the Asian Short Clawed family and it kept them quiet and busy for the rest of the day.

Dasher the Muntjac deer is continuing to do well at home, he is weaning now and growing too.

Hilda, William and their cub, who we have decided to call Pluto, continue to do well, we have seen them all sharing a box and John spotted William and Hilda coming out of one box in the afternoon and the cub came out of the other so they seem very relaxed with each other. The same cannot be said for Hilda’s attitude to her keepers! We went in on Thursday to cement the side of their pond as it has been leaking, we timed it so that they would be resting after their breakfast. The otters usually have a look to see what you are up to and then leave us to it but we always go in pairs in case they object to our presence. We have been keeping out of William and Hilda’s pen as much as possible so that we do not disturb them or cause unnecessary stress.
William was the first one out and he just swam and walked around us not really worried by our presence. Then Hilda who had been watching from her tunnel decided we were probably getting too near to the box where the cub was tucked up. She was out swimming around, charging at us, hissing and spitting the whole time. John was cementing and Sonia and I were on watch armed with brooms to keep the otters out of the way if they do get too curious. Hilda made a charge for my broom and bit it and pulled it straight out of my hands, she is so feisty. I think she got a shock too as she retreated whilst I retrieved my broom. We quickly finished the job as we did not want to upset her any more.
Pluto is getting much bolder and will come out and wait for his food with William and Hilda; yesterday tea time it was at the gate growling at me just as his Mum does!

We hope the snow will not be around for much longer as we have so many jobs left to and less than eight weeks to complete them in.

Herons and Buzzards

Well, we’ve had an extraordinary couple of days here. Firstly, yesterday (Thursday 22 January) Mandy was feeding the otters at tea time and saw William, Hilda and their cub (now about 12 weeks old) playing together in a very gentle, caring way. William is such a good dad he even allows the cub to take food from him when Hilda won’t give hers up. As we still don’t have any decent pictures of the cub Mandy went to the barn to get the camera and see if she could capture the moment.

Now, those of you who are familiar with our site will know that we have around 3 herons which, although wild can be seen regularly, usually about tea time when they scavenge the otters left-overs.

When Mandy returned to the pen she saw that Hilda had attacked a heron that had landed nearby and was in the process of killing it.

When otters and herons normally meet there is usually a kind of stand off, they do not attack each other as they have respect for the strength and weaponry of their opponent. After a few minutes one of them will become bored and move off and the other will claim the prize which is food.

For them to fight is a very rare event indeed and we can only think that Hilda saw the heron as a threat to her cub and decided to attack and kill it. The whole thing was over very quickly and the heron was almost certainly doomed from the first seconds of the attack but when William joined in its fate was sealed.

The otters appear to be uninjured even though the heron tried to stab with its beak several times.

Now this is a bit of a gory incident but it is nature in action and possibly uniquely Mandy caught a substantial amount of it on film. We have posted it on Youtube under the title ‘Heron takes on an otter and loses’. It may not be suitable viewing for the faint hearted.

Now on to the next incident; this morning (Friday 23rd January) Denis and I were at work and as I walked by our Bengal Eagle Owls I noticed something odd, it appeared that another bird of prey was in there aviary with them!

I called Denis and together we entered the aviary and saw a juvenile Buzzard had somehow squeezed through the wire mesh, probably to steal a free meal. He found that it’s much easier to get in when no-one is looking than it is to get out when you are being attacked by two Bengal Eagle Owls!

Fortunately none of the birds looked injured and it only took a couple of minutes to get the Bengals into their shed and then catch the terrified Buzzard by gently covering it with my coat. Once caught we took it to a woodland shelter and gave it a quick once over, no injuries but a big dent in his pride was all the experience had cost him, lucky boy. We released him and after a moment or two to gather himself he flew into a tree where he spent 20 minutes preening before disappearing further into the woods. A very lucky Buzzard indeed.

Otters on You tube

We have posted a short film of Biggy, Smalley, Leap and Cinnamon on You tube under the title "Eggstatic otters". It shows them in the first week of January 2009 just messing around really. We hope you like it..

Despite the recent freeze, associated burst pipes etc all the animals are fine. One of our hens shocked us (and maybe Mother Nature) by hatching out six chicks on 4th January; and no this is not a mollycoddled bird, this is an outdoor girl. To date they are all doing fine despite her refusal to accept our offers of heat and extra food.

We have also spotted some unusual movement in one of the wallabys' pouches which indicates that she either has a very bad tum or far more likely, she has a small joey in there.

Hildas' cub continues to do well but is very camera shy. We often see the three of them (William, Hilda and cub) playing together but as soon as I get get my camera out the cub goes in. I will keep trying though, and will post some pictures as soon as I have them.