Sunday 5 January 2014
Well Christmas is over, the New Year is
over, which as usual I saw in in bed fast asleep! I think the last time I saw
in the New Year was the millennium with a good friend of mine Arthur Middleton
and I am still kicking myself that we did not think to go up May Hill, it would
have been tremendous, never mind – next time!
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| A ford near us! |
Christmas Day and Boxing Day were lovely,
sunny and dry, and I think that one other day was good too, otherwise it
rained, and rained, and New Year’s day was I think the wettest day I can
remember for a long time. I went through three sets of clothing and was so cold
and wet after feeding round that I had to stop and get warm again before going
out to finish the cleaning up and bail water from in front of the weighing
room, that gave me the second set of wet clothes and taking the dogs out for a
walk did the final set – though to the skin all three times!
It’s raining now, we had a respite on Thursday,
it was good to see the staff back in, although Mark is not well. The hawk walk birds
all had a day out on the lawn, a good bath and a good clean, before having to
go back under their compartments again as the weather got worse.
We have five pair of birds on eggs, but
three are probably not going to have hatched eggs, they have been somewhat sketchy
in their incubation, however those pairs will probably relay. The Griffon
Vultures are on an egg, which is good, we will take and hatch it and then
return the chick at about ten days old if all goes well. Adam organised CCTV
camera’s on all the nests in Barn One and it is great fun to watch the birds
playing with sticks, completely demolishing their beautifully made nests, or
sitting on their egg. Sadly we can’t put it live on our website as the Broad
band here is too slow. So much for rural areas being looked after!!
There are rooves to fix, gutters to mend,
the old Secretary Bird aviary to sort out and make safe and birds to get flying
again (if it ever stops raining) all before we open again on February 1st,
I just don’t know where the time goes.
We are going to be filming the Burrowing
Owl’s nest, we have been asked to work with some Harris Hawks on a project at
Oxford University and my sparrow hawk Deneb is in demand, I am getting him out
this week to start flying.
I also have to go to India sometime this
month as we are going to be working with some of the parents and chicks to see
if we can improve on our breeding successes. Not likely to get bored I think!
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