Sunday 3 January 2010

January 3rd already, each day is two minutes more of daylight, and it begins to show when the days are clear! Holly and James came to dog/house sit for me while I went to stay with a friend for one night on Friday, which meant I could have a drink and not worry about driving. The minor roads, and I do mean minor roads were pretty icy, as indeed is our road outside the Centre. There has been a water leak for months above us and it runs down the road, the Water Board have been told several times but done bugger all about it. However now it is frozen and there is an ice rink outside our entrance, I wonder how long it will be before they fix it!!

It’s a beautiful day today, as was yesterday, I was in Wales yesterday and there was a light dusting of snow on the hills, it was quite stunning to look at, and I needless to say forgot my camera! Today it is cold again and the ground is frozen, which is tough on the small wild birds. We still have not had snow here, which is probably a good thing, although it would be fun for a short while, but last night it suddenly warmed up for a while and I thought we were going to get some.

I took Bay Middleton with me on Friday and we flew him on the grounds where I was staying, he was very well behaved and it is so lovely to see him fly, maneuvering between the trees and generally having a good time, there was not much about for him to chase though, but the day made up for it. We start the other working birds off again tomorrow, we have to have them ready to open in just under four weeks and that takes a bit of time. Not that the young birds have had much of a break, just over Christmas.

The African Spotted Eagle Owls have one egg, Athena and Hemlock look imminent for laying. We just about five nest ledges to get up this coming week, and I want to get Zoomesh on the front of eight of the owl aviaries in the owl courtyard, it makes such a difference to the look of them. Hopefully the Griffon Vultures will lay soon as well, and the Verreaux Eagles are mating daily, we are crossing everything for the Steller’s too, that would be wonderful. The Golden Eagles are very settled and looking good and the male African Fish Eagle is in breeding condition, so we are hoping he might possibly be brave enough to breed, that would be wonderful, even if she is a cow of the first order.

Life gets back to more normal tomorrow will nearly all staff back, and we start the run up to being open again. The new enclosure block is coming on, here is a picture of the back of it. Once that is complete, there are only a million other jobs to get done before opening!



1 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Mima
I have just found your Blog - actually was looking to see if, by any chance, you may be open. A b&b guest of mine wanted to come tomorrow. Never mind - I shall suggest he returns in the spring to enjoy the many delights of the Forest of Dean, incl icbp of course.
Deeply impressed by your blog - however do you find the time. I had thought I was pretty good with mine, but you quite put me to shame!!
Anyway, a very Happy New Year to you, and hope to see you soon. Any more painting needed?!
caroline (lea house b&b)

Hello

I have to say that keeping a weblog can at times become compulsive and at other times a chore. Sometimes I am berrated for not keeping it up and sometimes I get wonderful comments from people who follow the news of the Centre.

It is fun to share the daily goings on here, some good and some bad, some funny and some sad, but all a part of our daily lives.
And as I said before its a pretty cool to be here and it is a great place to visit, you should try coming and watching the birds and meeting the staff and of course the dogs.

Blog Archive

An interesting video on Lead

An interesting video on Lead

I find it staggering that people who want to hunt don't see the value in changing their ammunition from lead to a safer product. We have stopped using lead in petrol, in paint, in our water pipes, but they still want to use lead - ah well, apparently eating it not only kills birds but leads to reduced intelligence in humans......................

NO ONE is asking you to stop legal and genuine hunting, they are just asking you to change your ammunition!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHZGQ8i8AwI

HC

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