28. Visit The Cotswold Wildlife Park

We had never visited the Cotswold Wildlife Park before, although it is very close to where we live and we both love wildlife.



It's not a drive-through wildlife park, but one where you drive in and park and then walk round, so we spent a while studying the Park map before we went as we wanted to see whether I would need a mobility scooter. We decided we would start by walking round the walled garden, near the disabled parking spaces, which contains penguins and prairie dogs (above), aviaries with a wide range of colourful birds (below), and a variety of other small animals.





After lunch we walked round some of the other more central and accessible parts of the Wildlife Park, and then we hired a mobility scooter from the shop so that I could get to see the larger animals, including the clouded leopards (below, on a postcard, as I couldn't get close enough to get a good photograph).



Like most zoos and wildlife parks in the UK now, Cotswold Wildlife Park is less about people getting to see wild animals close-up, and more about breeding and conserving endangered species for the future (we wouldn't have wanted to visit if it hadn't been, and think they should put more emphasis on this on their website). Their Conservation Trust works closely with other conservation organisations and charities, and there are collection boxes and information about these in various places around the Park.



It was lovely to see the white rhinos (above) as they are a major conservation success story, having gone from fewer than 100 individuals left alive at the end of the nineteenth century to more than 20,000 today.



Some of the areas of the Wildlife Park weren't accessible because they were taking measures to protect their birds from avian flu, but we managed to see most of the other animals, including red pandas (on a postcard, above), and tapirs (below).



The Wildlife Park has lovely gardens and grounds, which would have been worth a visit even without the animals.





The only things we weren't keen on were the children's area (although we did like the donkeys, below) and the fact that the shop and restaurant close a full hour before the Park as a whole does. We hired the mobility scooter for two hours from 2.00pm, thinking we could return it at 4.00 and then have an hour to look round the shop and have tea, but when we collected it we were told we had to return it by 3.45 as the shop closes at 4.00 in the winter, and we ended up getting our tea from the nearby Burford Garden Company instead. It didn't really matter, as we'd had plenty of time to see all the animals, but we would have organised our day a bit differently if we'd been told when we booked the scooter that it would have to be returned so early.



Overall though, we had a lovely day, and we'd happily go back for another visit - and probably will do when the avian flu outbreak is over and we can see the areas we missed. We'd also love to spend more time with our favourite animals of the day - the wonderful fruit bats (below, on a postcard - although we did get close to these, I didn't want to take photos as I couldn't have done so without using flash). Perhaps we will even treat ourselves to one of their "Feed the Bats" animal encounters.

19. Join Something Local

We are members of several national charities - such as the National Trust, the RSPB, and the Woodland Trust - but we've never joined anything more local. This means, because I'm not well enough to go to the sort of big events or day courses run by national charities, that all we do is visit properties, reserves, and woods when we're on holiday - we never manage to get involved any more actively.

I wanted to join something local, partly so that we could have more days out in our own area, and partly in the hope that occasionally they might have smaller outdoor events that I could actually attend.

We've been aware of the Wildlife Trusts for a while - we have a guide to walks on their reserves ...



... and often use it to find places to visit on holiday. We also used it to discover the bluebell wood and wildflower meadow in Oxfordshire which we visited earlier this year as part of my 50 Things. If you like walking in the countryside (and have access to plenty of ordinance survey maps as many Wildlife Trust reserves are distinctly difficult to find) it's highly recommended!

The various Wildlife Trusts do a great job conserving wildlife on a local level, and their reserves are often ideal places for me to visit, as they tend to be very quiet and isolated. Some of their sites are small or are inaccessible for me, but others can be amazing places. On one, just off a busy B-road, a buzzard flew low over our path and along in front of us for some time. On another, after climbing a short and easy track (even for me) we had a view which stretched over several counties.

So we decided to join the Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust. We hope this means we'll be able to get involved in some local events, but even if that doesn't work out, it's a good cause and will provide us with some more days out in the countryside, and the opportunity to see some more wildlife ...



... and I can always join something else local in the future ...

18. ID Our Bats

When we moved here we were delighted to discover we had bats in the garden. Every dry evening in the summer we go out into the garden for a few minutes to watch them flying about. If we walk into the middle of the lawn, between the trees, they will sometimes swoop right past our heads, which we think is just wonderful.

I spent a while trying to work out what type of bats they are, but most of the online resources intended for this purpose, such as this ID chart, seem to assume that you have a clear view of the outline of a stationary bat and can measure the width of their wingspan. And you can't - they move far too fast! We thought ours were probably Pipistrelles, as these are the bats which people in the UK are most likely to see in our gardens, but we couldn't be sure.

So this year I was thinking of contacting our local bat group to see if they could help. And then I stumbled across this leaflet ...



... produced by the Bat Conservation Trust, which is much more useful than the silhouettes in the ID charts. It's clear from the flightpath diagrams that our bats are indeed Pipistrelles, though I may still contact the bat group as I'd like to know if they can help me discover which type of Pipistrelle they are.

If anyone else reading this wants to learn more about bats, the Bat Conservation Trust's website has a list of links to local groups here, and if you'd like to know about gardening for bats you should find this page helpful.

For more detailed information about the bats of the UK and some lovely close-up images, have a look at this site.

6. Adopt An Animal

When I asked friends what I could do to celebrate my 50th birthday, one of them suggested that as I love wildlife I should adopt an animal. I loved this idea, and when I wrote my list of 50 things to do, it was at the top of the list.

R and I have supported the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust for as long as I can remember. We both read Gerald Durrell's books as children, and were inspired by his work protecting endangered species. The wildlife park he established on the island of Jersey was the first to consider the welfare of its animals as more important than the interests of its visitors. Its primary purpose is not commercial, nor is it to give people the chance to view captive animals, but instead it is to save rare animals from extinction as they are studied, encouraged to breed, and ultimately re-introduced to the wild. Twenty years ago we were able to visit Jersey and see it for ourselves and it really is a shining example of conservation at its best. So when it came to adopting an animal, the DWCT website was the first place I looked.

I chose to adopt a gentle lemur. This was partly because when I did the animal personality test it told me I was a gentle lemur, but it was also partly because they don't have any gentle lemur gifts so if you adopt one they send you a dodo!



And as you probably realise if you are reading this blog, I never can resist a dodo.

The dodo is the symbol of the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, and also the subject of this video made for them by Aardman Animations (with Stephen Fry as a frog and Alastair McGowan voicing the dodo). Do watch it and share it if you have a couple of minutes. It's worth watching right to the end - the messages which come up in the middle are followed by more bits of the story. If like me you have noise or light sensitivity, there is some gentle background music but nothing loud or flashy.



Oh - and for those people who have been wondering what was in the box in my last post - well, while I was adopting my lemur, I thought I'd also adopt a bat for R.

We are both very fond of bats as well as of dodos, so they will probably crop up again later in this blog.