Thursday 8 July 2010

Update on the Symonds Yat Peregrine

Mima, I released the peregrine this afternoon. She has been crammed full of quail the last few days - I gave her a 1/4 quail this morning too. She was released at Vicki’s parents farm near Malton (20mins from my house). I spoke to the local gamekeeper here and he wasn't too keen on having yet another falcon to contend with!! She took off and landed in a tree a 100yds off. She sat there for 10 minutes and then took off, she caught a thermal about 1/2 mile away and shot up to around 700ft. She then went into a shallow fast glide due east. She disappeared over Thorpe Basset hill in the direction of the Yorkshire Wolds. Good crow hunting territory for her! The old cow never gave me as much as a backward glance! I was left feeling somewhat heartbroken and she was having the time of her life!! No gratitude these falcons you know. I am going to go and sulk now!

And while Charlie was sulking, (rightly so, these injured wild birds never appreciate all the work you do for them!!!!!) our French party was very nice and all the birds behaved well and the whole thing went off very smoothly, thank goodness. I luckily had to do some filming with the BBC, and so had to hand everything over to Adam, Holly and Robin and a sterling job they did of it too. The filming went well, all birds behaved, the model aeroplane was particularly quiet!! And the gentleman from Air Bus research dept Norman, was very pleasant, so that is another job done and dusted, well and professionally.

I did Cremorne off demonstration as we needed to have a little extra training session and she was better, the flying is fine, but she behaves very badly on the fist on the way out of the flying ground. Karis did a stunning stoop, the one I have been waiting for for days, it was breathtaking. And generally all the birds did well today.
So I felt justified in biking up the road to see the nice horse I like. I took him for a walk and was just cycling back when Iloana came up the road and told me I had to get back as Rush was not well. So I speeded back, to meet Adam coming up the road with Rush in the van. We went back and he was very uncoordinated, his back legs were not working properly at all. He was fairly cheerful and his tail was wagging, but generally he was very wobbly. I was thinking Stroke, or some other neurological problem, and was remembering Arabis last year, with her brain tumours. So I phoned the dogs vet, Eden Tanner in Ledbury, and he said put him somewhere quiet and give him a couple of hours and then if I was worried, ring them.

By 8.00pm he was still no better, so I phoned and Robin and I took him over to Ledbury, he had slipped in the weighing room earlier and that was the only thing I could think of that might have caused whatever the problem was. Eden checked him over thoroughly and said he thought it was probably a back injury to a disc (how well I understand those!!) so gave him a shot of Carpruphen (?) and sent him home. I am still concerned as he is not right, but hopefully things will improve tomorrow. What with vultures and dogs and what have you, I am exhausted!! Here is hoping that things will improve tomorrow.



0 comments:

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

Website counter

Followers