WonderfulWildlifeUK

Our otter cubs born a year a go have now both moved on to new adventures. Last year Dave and Nicole where born here at the end of the October half term to mum Emmy. They have stayed with mum and dad in our main enclosure until about two weeks ago where we caught them up and sent them off to their new homes.  Dave, now named Maxwell, has gone to the UK Wild Otter Trust based in the South West to a luxurious enclosure to help promote the great work they do there for otter conservation and education. His sister won't be too far away, Nicole has moved to the West Country Wildlife Photographic Centre. At the beginning of the month our polecat kits born here this year were collected by Ferret Rescue Surrey for release. They had been a lot of fun on display, and after a short period off display to get them used to looking after themselves they have now all gone off to be released.  This gave us space to move one of our breeding pairs back on to display. We thought we would...

  This past month we have been adapting the way in which we work to allow groups to still come and visit us. Our photographic days have been extremely popular, and we have even had a couple of schools and private groups come to see us all in line with our restrictions and the regulations, and of course we are still open to the public at weekends to pre booked online tickets. Before lockdown earlier in the year, we had just had two new pine marten enclosures built. They remained vacant for most of the summer while we were short staffed and still catching up with things, but this past month we finally managed to move our new martens on to display. An older male called Columbo is in one, and a young spritely female called Lyra in the other. Both are in the Dell, and almost certainly if you see one it will be Lyra.  She is pictured in the above two photographs and is settling in extremely well. Our red squirrels have been very active recently, and are beginning to gr...

We have had to adapt our photographic days slightly since re-opening to comply with new guidelines/restrictions and to keep everyone, photographers and staff, safe. All the same great opportunities are there for you to take some fantastic photos, just in smaller group sizes.  We still take photographers in to all the same enclosures, and all the animals have been as brilliant as usual, but there is no doubt that the real stars have been our wildcat kittens! There are a lot of visitors photos of our kittens up on the interweb on various social sites etc. I hadn't had the chance to take many recent photos of them myself, but looking through the many than had been shared, I had to make time to spend with them one evening last week.  They are growing fast, but still look very kitten like. Kind of going in to that leggy stage. Hilda's two kittens, who are slightly younger, seem to be a little shyer but still do venture out most of the time. Kendra's two however are a...

Adderlings! OK, baby adders or "neonates". But I prefer to call them adderlings.  Aren't they beautiful! Stunning little miniatures of their adult form... Bellatrix, our female, mated earlier this year after the boys showed off with their dancing and last weekend she gave birth. Unlike many snakes, adders don't lay eggs but give birth to live young... or to get a bit complicated, they appear to give birth to live young but in fact they develop inside the female in little egg sacs which usually erupt just before or while giving birth.  Female adders usually have around double figures of young, and we have seen eight at once so far... so a good litter.  Daddy's little girl!.. This gives you the scale (get it, scale :-) ) of how big the adderlings are when first born. This is a one day old adderling basking next to one of our males.  They are full independent from the moment they are born. The father, and even the mother, has nothing to do with them once...

It's been a strange year, a difficult few months, but finally we seem to be getting a little bit back to normality. We have been open to the public again, pre booking only, for the last month and it has been great to see many of you back here to share our wonderful wildlife with and to just give the Centre a "buzz" to the atmosphere.  Blog posts have been absent while we have been working short staffed to keep things moving, but hopefully the office have been keeping you all up to date with the animal news via our social media pages. We have some new arrivals I will introduce you to soon, lots of babies, but perhaps most popular of all at the moment are our two litters of wildcat kittens! Kendra, out experienced mum, gave birth seven and a half weeks a go now to two wildcat kittens. Both strong and healthy. They have been putting on a good show, coming out post days and playing near the back of the enclosure.  Then a couple of weeks later Hilda, one of our newe...

Our new display family of water voles have been out on the island for about 2 months now, and have settled in extremely well. Some may think this is due to the lockdown we are currently in, and no visitors being here... and maybe that has helped a little, but to be honest our water voles normally settle fairly quickly once they are out on the island. It is a very large, natural enclosure for them and so plenty of space to hide if they so wish.  I took the photo at the top of Walter, one of our male voles, a few days a go. It was a quick snap and go while he was eating breakfast and I was doing routines, but it made me think I must spend a bit of time with them and my camera. Yesterday morning was that time!.. I had a few minutes, so spent ten of them in around the island with my camera. The voles are active on and off through out the day, but usually have a peak around 10am. That's when I was there.  I managed to see all five... Walt, Skyler, Saul, Gus and Jessie...

A little later than I would of hoped, but here are a couple of photos and videos of our adders "dancing" this year. These are two of our males, Draco and Lucius, fighting or competing over a female. This fight displays itself in a rhythmic display of them intwining their bodies together, often raising the first third of their body off the ground, and trying to push each other away. The force of the interaction means they occasionally fling apart from each other but are unlikely to get hurt or injured. They never bite each other. It is a beautiful thing to watch, and something I look forward to every year. Because of the motion and delicacy of it all it is often called the "dance of the adders". Our adders finished "dancing" just over a week ago so here are a couple of video clips below. One brief, and one a little longer from a different angle and more close up. Also a couple more photos form this year... not much time to take any more I'm afraid...

Sadly last Friday Clyde the pine marten passed away. He died peacefully in his sleep of old age, he wasn't far from twenty! Many of you who have visited over the end of last year, early this year, will know he was getting very frail and slow. Due to his cataracts he was blind for the last few months, but knowing his pen inside out was still able to climb and wander around to find everything. Working closely with our animals, you always build a bond with them, and as most of you will know I had a particular bond with our pine martens. Clyde was one of the first pine martens I ever worked with, and as such helped to guide and nurture my love and respect for these beautiful animals. I spent a lot of time working with him on an almost daily basis, and as such he was arguably the most friendliest pine marten you would of met! Losing an animal is always a sad time, but some hit your harder than others. I talk to the animals, crazy I know, but I really think it helps them to a...