Bad dip in Hampshire, no Brown Shrike.

Polecat

We have a choice do we go with Brian for the Brown Shrike, or head  up to see the Lesser Shrike & maybe head to Lynford for one more look for the Two-barred Crossbill.
We decide to stick together & go for the Brown Shrike, it takes two hours & we arrive at 8 o'clock & soon meet up with some old faces, as it turns out that is all we see in the three hours that we spend here.
With nowhere near of interest to us Brian comes up with the idea to head to the British wildlife centre to get some close up photos of the animals that are there.
None of us have been here before,but we soon find out that we have made a good choice.
The first thing we see are the Red Squirrels, they have a lot of space to move about in even running up our legs & looking in our bags, we spend a long time with them.
Next it's the Stoats & Weasels we can get very close to these for some nice photos.
Then it's the turn of the polecats to show off to us,right next to them is the Badgers that show well.
Now round the next corner its the Otter pool, you can never see enough of these wonderful creatures,we spend a long time watching them play & feed.
The Pine martins are next up really great to see these running around at great speed all over the place.
Scottish wildcats are next on the list, they look very tame, but I am told that they are really nasty & give a really nasty bite if handled in the wrong way.
A display by five of the Owls brings the visit to an end, we see Snowy Owl,Eagle Owl,Barn Owl, Tawny & Long-eared owl, all very nice to watch.

Badger

Otter

Scottish Wildcat

So a really nice day after all, we dipped on the main target but this more than made up for the miss, I would tell anybody looking for a good day out to give this ago.

Weasel