UK Nature Blog

Ring-tailed lemur

Obviously this isn't indigenous to the UK, being Madagascan ordinarily, but I couldn't resist this picture of a cheeky chappy (or lady for all I know) at Whipsnade Zoo. You can walk amongst these Ring-tailed lemurs in a special enclosure. They reminded me of cats, walking haughtily with their tails held high.

Lion

Admittedly this is rather cheating as far as UK nature goes, but I couldn't not post this picture of an imperious male lion taken at Whipsnade Zoo. They tend to loll around by the floor to ceiling glass of the viewing area, hence availing themselves of good close up photos. That is assuming you can find a clean enough bit of glass to put your lens up against.

How do they keep their fur so clean when presumably they nosh down on bloody meat? I suppose they bathe in a pool and lick themselves clean but I'm still rather surprised.

Window squirrel

We have a neat bird feeder that attaches to the glass of our sliding doors which affords us close up views of blue tits and great tits for the main part. They seem entirely happy to be there just a few feet from you, though if you move much they dash off. This squirrel however is totally fearless and seems to understand how glass works - i.e. you can get as close as you like on the other side of it but you can't touch it.

This allows for some close-up squirrel photography, though reflections can be a bit of a problem, as can the dirty windows and lack of light on the side I'm photographing.

UK Wallabies

The wallaby pictured above is actually at Whipsnade Zoo, but you may be surprised to hear that they can be found living in the wild in the UK too in a few particular places. See the Feral Populations sections of the Wikipedia page on Wallabies for the details of the populations that have come and gone in a few choice spots.

Actually the Whipsnade wallabies are generally allowed to roam freely within the extensive parkland grounds of the zoo along with other animals like Muntjac deer and Mara, which I blogged on previously. It's easy to see how they could live quite happily in the wild in the UK, being bouncier deer in many respects.

Chris Packham interview - part 2

After yesterday's introduction, here follows the second instalment in our big interview with Chris Packham, supporting Allinson's Conservation Grade program and associated free bird feeder promotion. The third and final instalment is also now available.

In fact you may well have seen Chris on TV this evening presenting the Animal's Guide to Britain on BBC2. I thought it was rather good, especially the beavers and jumping up and down on the rippling layer of 'land' atop a buried lake.

Topics this time round include being something other than a bird-spotter and Chris' nature photography. Stay tuned for more, including Chris' favourite nature related joke in the next instalment!

Mouse nest?

Clearing out the shed at the weekend I found lots of evidence of things living there past and present! Right in the back corner buried beneath a mountain of old flowerpots was this scrappy ball of detritus. I assume it must be a mouse nest as it has clearly been constructed by some animal, having very clear circles of dead grass in its base (not visible above), bits of old string and even nylon line of some sort.

I couldn't discern any actual 'entrance' to the nest as such or any definite evidence of mice - e.g. droppings in the shed, but I can't see what else it could be. I did once see a small sandy coloured mouse sprinting down the side of the shed, so I know they have been present. Perhaps a harvest mouse?

Tiger face

I crept up to this tiger as it slept and took a close-up photo. Either that or it was behind two layers of mesh fence at Whipsnade zoo, I can't remember...

Otter pandemonium

Feeding time for the otters at Whipsnade Zoo. As if I could get a picture like that in the wild!

Mara at Whipsnade Zoo

A recent visit to Whipsnade Zoo offered an opportunity to see exotic creatures not usually spotted in the UK. But amidst the elephants, tigers and giraffes, smaller less assuming animals roam free in their 600 acres. One of these is the Mara, which at first glance looks like a big rabbit. Or a very small deer. It's actually the fourth largest rodent in the world and quite interesting to read up on courtesy of Wikipedia or Whipsnade's own page.

It looks especially rabbity when sat as above, though when stood up you can see the long legs and hoof-life feet at the back. As far as I can tell these haven't escaped into the wild and become established, though they're clearly happy enough roaming the Dunstable Downs fairly freely, but within the confines of the zoo.

Foxy interloper - mange or moult?

Our recent Hedgehog feeding turned up a surprise this evening. Just an hour after the Hedgehog had been seen chowing down at 9pm as per usual, a rather mangy looking Fox turned up! That was rather a shock, though we had suspected a Fox uses the garden since we'd seen what I was fairly sure were Fox paw-prints in the snow. Actually that paw-print post is one of the most popular on this blog with lots of incoming search hits whenever it snows somewhere in the UK, so I assume that plenty of people have foxes in their garden that only become apparent when the white stuff betrays their presence.

You can see in the rather poor photo that it's lacking fur on its rear and the base of the tail (and an extremely long tail it is) and the rear legs look a bit shaky too. I looked up "Fox mange" and apparently it is fairly classic for this parasitic infection to begin around that area, however moulting foxes in the Spring can be confused as having mange. I'm really not sure which would be the case here. Would anybody out there care to venture an opinion?