British Wildlife Center - once again

Back in May, one of the first conservation places I visited was the British Wildlife Center. I thought I'd visit again, months later to see how the little fox vixen, Luna was doing grown up, but didn't catch her yesterday :( In any case, I spent my time focusing on stuff that I'd not get many shots of the last time, such as the Red Squirrels (there seem to be many, many more this yesterday, with little baby squirrels) and Wildcats.






Don't think I have any adult red squirrel shots from yesterday. No keepers anyways. The 300/4 + 1.4x was the ticket as they are very tiny (compared to elephants), or quite big (compared to harvest mice). 420mm + 1.5x dslr + 1.45m close focus yield very nice close ups, though I do wish I could stop down for more dof.



Scottish Wild Cats are housed in big enclosures covered in a sort of netting. The enclosure itself is sunk into the ground, so you'll have to shoot downwards. There are gates for entry into the enclosure (for the keepers, not the public) where you can get a low angle shot. I've not shot from there so no idea...



Here's one of the European otters cosplaying a crocodile. Notice the two sets of whiskers....



I'd my share of shots so I moved away to let people have a better view. Decided to take a kind of environmentish type of shot - the center has a talk every half an hour for most of the animals, this is the best time to shoot as they will be very active then (OM NOM NOM NOM). Great way to learn about the critters themselves too!



The badgers have a lovely indoor sett where you can walk in to view them behind glass windows. I'd love to show you pictures, but no tripod = no pics :P Badgers have one feeding time late in the afternoon, it's quite tough to capture all the detail :( Damned white and black.




The foxes can be seen early in the morning, late in the afternoon and at feeding times, when you'll probably see them with the most antics.





70-200 is great for the wider environment shots, and the 300 + TC for getting in close.



Cute, but no dingo.



Hedgehogs are also part of the fauna that kids learn about at the BWC. After the talk, we're allowed to stroke the little critter's spines.



Can you see the water vole? No, I doubt it...



Here's the 16-85 at 85mm....



Red turning tail ;-)