Linford, Burrowing Owl.
There are few things sweeter

Well Spring is most definitely in the air now and that means that the centre is starting to regain some normality and routine. Birds are starting to be retrained ready for the main season (starting 20th March) and staff have just about had all the holiday their going to see until next year. I had a wonderful time away last week in Iceland seeing the Northern Lights, which was on my bucket list, and soaking in the Blue Lagoon but it's good to be back with the birds and back to preparing for demonstrations again. I have to say it's also a bonus for us bird staff having the tea room open again - somewhere warm that has tea and cake has got to be a winner hasn't it?

The diggers out in force

We've been fielding enquiries for new volunteers this week too - three individuals have contacted us, one of whom has just been to see Peter and I for a visit and hopefully we can but them to work very soon - there's rather a lot of staining to do before the summer opening as the rain (would you believe it?) has washed rather a lot of it away. We wouldn't mind some help shifting the huge pile of fresh chippings that are to be in the seating area of the Old Rose Garden.





This is where our new 'World of Owls' flying demonstration is going to be when we start flying again and it's taken a great deal of work to get it where it is now but, as ever, there's still lot's to do before it's ready. The lads here at Muncaster have played a massive part in preparing this area so a great deal of the credit for how the area ends up looking goes to them. I'm hoping we can get the space more or less there about 5 days before opening to give Emma, Stuart and I the chance to try the birds there before we need to show anyone.

Emma with ASBO

The joy of working with a well established flying team is the speed at which they get back on the ball after a break. Just a day or two into training and ASBO, Nutmeg, Conan and Iris are practuically ready to fly free. Actually ASBO has now flown free - he's doing about half a dozen passes to the lure at the moment and that will increase as he builds fitness. This wont take long. The owls will take a little longer I think - we're still waiting on Whippet to moult his tail feathers and, to be honest, I don't hold out much hope for him being ready for the start of the flying season but we'll see. Herriot is in a similar boat and looks more than a tad messy. We don't like to fly birds with feathers broken, on the odd occasion its unavoidable but in this case we'll just have to be patient and wait for them to drop and regrow. We're also expecting to have William, Foxpitt and Bandele, the Yellow Billed Kites, back with us from the 7th March when Penny and Ash visit from the Hawk Conservancy. This will be a good chance for us all to catch up and prepare ourselves for what we hope will be a successful season in 2016. Plus HCT are like an extension of the family for us working with the birds so it'll be nice to see another couple of friendly faces!

Who could these tunnels be for?

New flyers are well and truly out there now. This year the marketing team have given the centre a whole side of the leaflet meaning that it looks almost like a stand-alone attraction. The hope is that people who have an interest in wildlife and specifically birds of prey will spot the flyer on the stand - then again lots of our interest is generated through the website now and I'm told that the Hawk and Owl Centre page is now the 3rd most visited on the site. With improvements to the whole site still to come we should hopefully reach even more people who will in turn want to come and support us. Perhaps that will be you! See you soon....