Thank goodness it stopped raining finally, yesterday was a pain, although we did get a surprising number of birds flown and a surprising number of visitors considering how awful it was. Apparently I upset a customer because I told their child not to kick the mud and puddles at the gate (and me!) and not to go under the standoff barriers which are there to protect people and birds. One of the parents thought I was not nice and my office staff felt sorry for them until one of the children lay on the floor yelling and kicking her feet on the floor!! Then she understood - oh well. I think that is the first person I have upset since Jan, which is not bad going really!

Arabis seems better today, she is still not seeing well out of her right eye, but is a little more cheerful in herself. She does not appreciate being left downstairs and howls to be let up - great, just what I need at 3.00am! She and Indigo went to the vets today, which took time, but relieved my mind as its nice to know they are in good hands.

The owl day went well I think, its great to have so many owls working now, and the baby Long-eared Owl is enchanting. Cool Ground - the snowy owl is a handful, but flies very well and the other owls are all coming along nicely so we should have great Owl Evenings later in the year.

Nathan is back and mowing the lawns, which is a relief, the grass is growing so fast its hard to keep up with, but it looks so good when it is freshly cut, and there is no smell as wonderful as newly mown grass with the sun on it.

The young falcons are all going well, Common is loose and doing well, Duck Weed (yup I am afraid that it stuck as a name!) did interestingly today. And the other two falcons that I am doing are coming on as are the two and Holly and Adam are training, AND my young Harris Hawk went loose today for the first time. Its been a tough but lovely day

Its been a hectic start to the week, got back from the CLA Game Fair latish on Sunday, and unloaded all birds, camping stuff (I hate camping!) and stuff. Came in the house, and was welcomed by the dogs, however Arabis is worse now. She spent two days at the vet being checked over, her poor eye has the pupil completely dilated, which must be very uncomfortable as she can't control the amount of brightness. Her eyebrow is dropped and to cap it all she had a back problem as well. She is not allowed to go upstairs so I left her in my office, which is also the main room we (the dogs and I) use, but she was howling at 3.00am and so I put her in with the others in the kitchen, and still more howling! She is not happy about not being on the bed with me.

The birds did very well at the Game Fair, first day was very very windy and they all flew well, Karis the Saker got blown away but came in within 15 seconds of seeing the lure once I found an unoccupied space to swing it for him! On the second day he did the most brilliant two stoops, two teardrops from between 200 and 400 feet, it was a joy to watch. Hare (tawny eagle) got blown away in the afternoon but waited for me in the Duke's garden - nice of him (the eagle that is, and the Duke come to think of it!) The last day all the birds did well even though the weather was not great.

On Monday Arabis's face had swollen up, so rushed off to the vet to have her looked at. She has a tooth problem, I can't believe that the eye and the tooth are not related. She is back without the tooth but no one seems to know what is wrong, so hopefully various pills will do the trick, she is a little more cheerful today.

All the birds flew well today, the wind is still with us (tuesday), the only one who was a little dramatic today was one of the baby peregrines, the smallest female, who flew off down the field and ended up in the pond!! I wish there was a racehorse called duckweed (racehorses are the theme for names this year) because he was covered in the stuff!

Hooray for Marshall telemetry, it works under water!!