Welcome to family, friends and visitors. Here you will find interesting (hopefully) pictures of my part of the world, news of our household and probably, long ramblings about anything that catches my interest.

Wednesday 30 June 2021

Zoo Day.

A fairly bright day though the clouds rolled in just as Peter and I settled down on the sunloungers in the afternoon and it wasn't as hot as we'd hoped.
I'm truly proud of my weeding efforts at the zoo. It may not look like a show garden but before I started not a bit of the ground was visible with 5ft high stinging nettles and a few docks filling the whole area. I'd brought along my gardening fleece to protect my arms from the nettles and several rampant roses but it was so hot that I opted to work very carefully in my vest top. Got only a few stings and scratches and just one bite from an angry red ant. The rheas were happy to eat the stinging nettles that I'd carefully pulled out first and then I wriggled my way in and working on my knees dug up every stinging nettle root, about half a skip bucket full.
The wolf dogs came to watch and sniff my hand again before settling down in a shady spot.

The lookout merekat watching out for aerial danger. While I was chatting to one of the workers a pair of red kites were lazily circling as they caught a thermal above us. Big as they and buzzards are neither species would not be interested in the merekats as their main food is worms supplimented by roadkill.

The merekats are such fun to watch. As soon as they spot you they come running over and chatter away with all sorts of chirps and mutterings.
This afternoon we saw our first seal in the bay (only a tiny picture). It stayed for a while so I went down on the cliff to watch it and try for a decent photo. I tried whistling to it and it turned to look at me before diving down and disappearing off. Guess I wasn't musical enough.
After our failed attempt to bask in the sun I decided to give the hedge at the end of the front garden a bit of a trim. The trouble with hedges is they have a tendency to keep on growing. I didn't think I'd have lots to cut but when I meaured off a line just above head height there was a good foot of growth to cut back. Up on the handy steps followed by lots of snipping got the hedge back down to a sensible level. 
I'd not long taken this photo of the sun giving a 'spotlight' effect on the sea when we saw a couple of dog walkers stopped on the cliff one of whom was taking photos. 'Strange' we thought 'when there isn't a sunset' when we realised they'd spotted dolphins down in the water. It wasn't the usual views of their fins breaking the surface as they surfaced momentarily but at least two dolphins playing and splashing about. I was lucky enough to see one jump right out of the water to hit it with its side on the way down. We've seen dolphins leaping out of the water on the way to Lundy but it's a first for here.


3 comments:

happyone said...

Must be so nice to work at the zoo.

Ruta M. said...

It is nice but since the current owners bought the zoo five years ago they've had major financial problems and being closed for over a year hasn't helped. (All the animals in the zoo are rehomed unwanted animals.)A lot of the animals have had to be sent to other zoos and I can feel that people are very stressed. but yes I do enjoy it.

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