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Sorry Elsie and Sue I have found two postings on…

Sorry Elsie and Sue, I have found two postings on the forum last night that I must have missed on the 9th of November, and did not approve.

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Bliss and Misty arrived at their new home in Chantilly…

Bliss and Misty arrived at their new home in Chantilly at about 10.30am this morning. When I spoke to the Horse Transporter Driver, he assured me that they had both travelled very well and had not sweated up at all, always a good sign. The sea crossing was from Portsmouth was very calm. Both Fillies unloaded in his words, like old pros, pity the didn’t load as well. At the moment they are stabled next to each other. I must admit that I am relieved that they have arrived with no problems. It is not nice going out to the stables and yard without them being there, I reckon that it will take a good few days to get use to it. I will be travelling to Chantilly within the next few days, and I will let you know what it is like and how Bliss and Misty are. I shall also take a few photos to show you on the website.

The Red Deer Stag and the Hinds must be in the woods around Denbury. I saw the young Stag who was with them and being chased off on Monday night, but not the main herd. The young Stag would not have been far from the Herd. With a bit of luck they may be around tonight. The Stag came very close to the camera last night and I managed to get a good close in on the camera . I pretty sure that I saw eyes through the mist when that came down.

What we have seen over the past couple of days to our surprise, right above Lady’s stable was a Sparrow feeding a fledgling. We have also seen a lot of Blackbirds near the Farm House, and it looked very much as if two might have been mating. I will keep a look out to see if they have a nest.

I spoke to the Scottish Wildlife Trust about their webcams not working. Peter the Manager has had an accident. As he is the only person looking after the Lock of the Lowe’s visitors centre in the Winter there is no one else to get the webcams going. They will be back ASAP. Fortunately Denbury Farm has had some good wildlife visiting.

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swt peter accident deer been about pretender about last ntwo…

swt peter accident
deer been about, pretender about last ntwo nights s ago
stomach turning lttle tear, if they can ? will they think bad of us
lot of mist last night
rabbit arcass on stick

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It took an hour and a half to load Bliss…

It took an hour and a half to load Bliss and Misty on the Horse box this evening. They just didn’t want to get on. I thought that they may not be going to France today. We tried to entice them with herbal treats, their feed but nothing was working. With one person on the lead rope and two behind holding hands and pushing still got us nowhere. A number of times we managed to get Bliss up the ramp with her two front legs in the box, but she wouldn’t go any further, and would just push back making it impossible to stop her getting herself off of the box. Misty wouldn’t even put one foot on the ramp. I had gone to the Veterinaries this morning to get them a mild sedative in case they played up on the journey. I gave them that hoping that it would sedate them, so that they would not realise what was happening to them. I just as well had not bothered, for it hardly touched them. We led Arnie on to the Horse box hoping that the Fillies might follow him up, even with Arnie calling out to them, they wouldn’t follow. Three more people from the Horse box yard came to help and by brute force pushing and pulling from behind we got Bliss into the Box. We thought Misty would follow Bliss straight on, but no way was she having any of it, so we needed to push and pull as with Bliss. It was well gone the Badger feeding time by the time they were on the lorry. Now they are on their way to a complete change of life.

We really did believe that Bliss and Misty being so laid back would go on the Horse box without any problem. You can practice boxing with them, but that can back fire on you as the Horses know what is going to happen to them, and know what the open back of a Horse Box is, and wont even go near it. Or you can try what we did this evening, hoping that not knowing what is was, they would be curios. You just cant tell with Horses.

A couple of years back we had a couple of Horses here for a couple of days. They must have boxed on a number of occasions previously to get here. They were collected from Denbury from a Horse transport company from Newmarket, so there was no way that they could not be collected. I was out when the lorry got here, but by all accounts they would not load. There was only the Driver and one other person here to get them loaded. Under no circumstances would I have let it happen if I had been here, for the Driver whipped the Horses on to the box. It took a long while to load Bliss and Misty, but they were not hurt in doing so.

I may not have told you about Indy, when he was sold earlier in the year. Jim a friend of mine had purchased him. He came to collect Indy in a two horse box. In between the lorry cab and the partition was a gap so that you could go and check the Horses. Indy was like Bliss and Misty not wanting to load. We eventually got him loaded, and as the ramp was lifted all hell let lose. Indy seeing the outside from the cab window decided that that was the way he was going. He tried to jump over the partition breaking a part of it and getting stuck. He broke Jim’s Wife’s nose who was try to stop him from getting over the partition, and finished up in a position that if we were unable to get him back, he would have broken his legs and would have been put down. Indy was eventually released none the worse for the experience, but it was close. Jim came back a few weeks later with a different box. To make sure that it didn’t happen again he was sedated and boxed alright getting back to Jim’s without any problems.

I will let you know when and how Bliss and Misty arrived in France in tomorrows Diary. I must admit it has been very hard to let them go and we will really miss them both. We are all bit choked up that they have gone, but they need to go on from here, to try to do what they have been bred for.

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I hope none of you who had wanted to see…

I hope none of you who had wanted to see Bliss and Misty being worked for the last time missed them being ridden. The weather was a bit grim this morning. fortunately the weathermen got it right today and it brightened up this afternoon. It didn’t rain as hard as they forecast but it was very windy, so much so that most of the leaves on the trees around the Farm House have blown off. We have a number of Acacia trees in the yard and they are completely bare.

Both Bliss and Misty worked well today. Misty was on her toes a bit. With the leaves being blown off of the trees she could see the Sheep properly, that previously the trees had obscured, they made her look a bit, so I needed to walk with her a little. We have taken a few photos of the Fillies that I will post on the website as soon as I am shown by my web man.

I must admit every time that we see the Fillies we start talking about them, about them not being here after tomorrow. We have no preferences for any of the Horses, but Bliss and Misty will be missed more than any that have left Denbury previously. Both are very kind and want to be around people which has made them very easy to work with, especially when they were being broken. What ever happens in their racing careers, both will return to Denbury to be Broodmares.

Marie asked if any one who knows Bliss and Misty will be travelling with them to France, and will they be close when stabled. They will be travelling over night, arriving in Chantilly about midday on Tuesday. There is no one spare at Denbury to travel with them. I really cant afford the time to travel there myself, but I will sometime in the week go. Bliss and Misty will be stable next to each other. The Trainer also has a double stable, that he may put them both in. I will let you know all about what happens to both Bliss and Misty over the coming months.

I was speaking to one of the UK Trainers who I had enquired about training Bliss and Misty. He never came back to me as he had lost my phone number. When I told him that I had decided to send the Fillies to France, he said that he did not blame me, as he agreed that the training fees were a lot less than in the UK and the prize money was a lot better in France. He also knew the Trainer, and had visited his training establishment. He was impressed with both. The Trainer that they are going to only trains about fifty Horses at a time, and has a good reputation.

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I am having problems with my computer I am unable…

I am having problems with my computer. I am unable to get the WBC site, the Forum or Diary. Someone is updating the Forum for me and pasting the Diary on to the Diary page from an email that I have sent.

After watching the Red Stag Rut last night, I sat down and glanced through this weeks local paper, only to read the article below. The Quantock Hills are from where the Red Deer that you saw last night on the webcam come from. They are very close to Denbury. As you know I am not a supporter of Hunting, but unfortunately this is one of the down sides of the Hunting Ban. The Hunts have over many years controlled the Red Deer numbers.

These are the contact details of Dr.Jochen Langbein in case you want to make representation to him.

*Phone number 01984 641366 Email info@deercollisions.co.uk Address Greenleas. Chestnut Avenue. Washford. Somerset. TA23*

Deer cull proposal labelled a ‘shooting spree’
/By Lloyd Vaughan /

THE number of red deer on the Quantock Hills could be halved if plans by a conservation group go ahead.

The Quantock Deer Management and Conservation Group has sent letters to landowners on the hills to drum up support for a mass cull of red deer on November 30, which will target fe-male and young deer.

The group claims deer numbers are ‘unacceptable’ and that the animals are causing damage to forestry and farming interests.

The group aims to hold an annual cull over the next five to ten years to re-duce population levels.

But the South West Deer Protection Group has condemned the cull and branded it “a shooting spree”.

Its chairman Kevin Hill said: “One problem with the proposed shooting spree is that any deer in the sight of the gun might be shot.

We’re not against the principle of culling deer. Our job is to make people think.

“I’m into the minimum number being culled, but this looks like one big blast.”

Deer biologist and secretary of the Quantock Deer Management and Con-servation Group, Dr Jochen Langbein, told the County Gazette that action must be taken to protect farmland from damage.

“I think they don’t really understand that it’s meant to be one day of culling not a major slaughter of deer.

We’re aiming to try and get deer back to levels people are happier with over a period of about five years,” he added.

“Almost every farm we work with feels there are too many deer and most are happy to see 20 or 30 deer roaming the fields, not 50 or 60.”

The group hopes the cull will take place in the morning and evening of November 30.

The Quantock Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty group is also supporting the plans.

Group development officer Iain Porter said: “It’s not designed to eradicate red deer but to bring levels back to a sustainable deer heard.”

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The Stag that you have seen tonight is a Royal…

The Stag that you have seen tonight is a Royal Stag. After seeing the Deer on Wednesday night I thought that they would be back, as the way the Stag was mating, I thought that they must be using Denbury for the Rut. The Stag chased away a young pretender who tried his luck with one of the Hinds on Wednesday. There does not seem to be as many Hinds tonight, although there could well be some in the woods. I must admit that I am pleased that they have returned. Moments like this make the webcams worth doing, and what we are seeing is live.

No, Elsie we haven’t planted the trees yet, to be honest I ha-vent even ordered them. I was told by my supplier that they would be in by now. We do need to do some tree planting on the Farm. Since we have lived here we haven’t done a lot, just the odd tree here and there around the lake and holiday cottages. We have lost a number of nice trees since we have lived here, mainly by the wind. My Lads have been cutting up a few over the past weeks for firewood. We have decided that we are going to plant about sixty whips, consisting of Cherry, Elm for the hedges, Silver Birch and Maple. We will also put in some more mature trees, and a eighteen foot Weeping Willow around the Lake.

Jan, when there is no one in the Hide, the Fox are always watching me put the Badger food down. I did get a little worried earlier in the year when there were six of them feeding. I thought that they may have been shot. I think that there are three coming to feed at the moment, one of them only now and then. There is one Fox that is going very close to the Badger Sett entrance. You may have seen him on camera one going in to the gap in the hedge that the Badgers come out from, The Sett entrance is within inches of the gap, he will be caught by the Badgers one day.

Who ever asked if the Bliss and Misty had gone to France yet? They are leaving the Farm Monday night and will arrive in Chantilly about Midday Tuesday. Not an over long journey, but we will worry about them. We will try to put travel boots on their leg to protect them, and tail bandages to stop them from rubbing there tails out on the journey. The intention was for us to be in Chantilly for when they arrived, and after meeting the Trainer we were going to spend a couple of nights in Paris. That has now changed. I am going to France on my own, a day or so later, trying to get there and back in one day. It is going to be tight as I wont fly. As I am travelling from Somerset, it is a two and a half hours journey before I get to St.Pancras for the Eurostar. Chantilly is only half an hour by train from Paris. There has been a few rail strikes in France, so that may cause me a problem. If I need to stay over for one night it wont be a disaster. The Trainer has offered to take me to a good restaurant and I do like France. Normally the French trains are never late. UK railways could learn a lot from them, for keeping to timetables, cleanliness and their very low cost fares. We will shortly be able to upload photos on one of the website pages, so as well as other subject I hope to be able to show you how Bliss and Misty are doing. When I am in France I will also see if there is a Television Channel in France for Horse Racing that I can pay to get here. What ever I will let you know how they are getting on.

As last Sunday we will be showing Bliss and Misty working for the last time in the sand school before they go to France.

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Pat and all the others who have asked Lady s…

Pat and all the others who have asked, Lady’s pregnancy is all as it should be. Unfortunately we did see Willow feeding from her yesterday, so we will need to wean her from Lady.

We are always looking out for new wildlife sites to broadcast webcams from. Often we are asked to get involved in a project, on other occasions we contact organisation to see if will let us broadcast from their venues. There are various reasons why we are unsuccessful and are unable to broadcast from venues. Often it can be that there is little interest, others do not want a third party to be involved in their websites. The overriding reasons for not being able to broadcast is the locations and a lack of a good broadband connection. We were unable to do a Golden Eagle from Scotland because the site being so remote. We are still talking to the people I told you about earlier in the year and four other sites, two with Beavers and another with a Bird of Prey. An other that we hope we will be doing is with the Barn Owl Trust.

Today I got an email from Simon, about a site in Spain. I have copied part of the email that I received to give you the information. The are a number of problems with the site. One being a low Broadband connection, another the remoteness of the location, needing solar power and maybe wireless camera. Simon is very keen to get it going, so I am sure that if we are unable to broadcast from the site, it wont be for the want of trying. Check out his website Simon is a photographer. www.wildaslife.com

Start of Simons email.
I am making a general inquiry regarding the placement of a webcam in one of several Griffon Vulture nest close to my home in Andalusia, Spain.

I am an English freelance photographer, with a strong passion for the natural world www.wildaslife.com contains examples of my wildlife images, also I have stills images and 16mm film footage of Patagonian Pumas and a rare and endangered species of deer the southern Andean Huemul (hippocamelus bisulcus ) from Chile in the www.arkive.org library in Bristol.

Since moving to Andalusia 5 years ago I have spent considerable time in the Sierr Ctrestallina close to the village of Casares. On the west side of this 4km long sierra is a year round colony of Griffon Vultures, with approximately 80 pairs nesting there. I have been photographing them soaring close to my position on the rock face and have built up considerable portfolio of them soaring close to the face as well as them coming and going from the nests and roosting spots. I have managed to locate 3 nests where I am able to get very very close and in 2 casesenter if I wished.

I believe one of these nests would provide a fantastic opportunity to place a webcam and allow the public to view the feeding of the chick in the nest by the adults. I have observed and photographed this, and have attached a number of jpegs to give you some idea of what could be seen with a camera. The very latest nest I have located allows me to sit in a perfect position looking down into the nest which is only 10ft away from my observation spot.

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Pat and all the others who have asked Lady s…

Pat and all the others who have asked, Lady’s pregnancy is all as it should be. Unfortunately we did see Willow feeding from her yesterday, so we will need to wean her from Lady.

We are always looking out for new wildlife sites to broadcast webcams from. Often we are asked to get involved in a project, on other occasions we contact organisation to see if will let us broadcast from their venues. There are various reasons why we are unsuccessful and are unable to broadcast from venues. Often it can be that there is little interest, others do not want a third party to be involved in their websites. The overriding reasons for not being able to broadcast is the locations and a lack of a good broadband connection. We were unable to do a Golden Eagle from Scotland because the site being so remote. We are still talking to the people I told you about earlier in the year and four other sites, two with Beavers and another with a Bird of Prey. An other that we hope we will be doing is with the Barn Owl Trust.

Today I got an email from Simon, about a site in Spain. I have copied part of the email that I received to give you the information. The are a number of problems with the site. One being a low Broadband connection, another the remoteness of the location, needing solar power and maybe wireless camera. Simon is very keen to get it going, so I am sure that if we are unable to broadcast from the site, it wont be for the want of trying. Check out his website Simon is a photographer. www.wildaslife.com

Start of Simons email.
I am making a general inquiry regarding the placement of a webcam in one of several Griffon Vulture nest close to my home in Andalusia, Spain.

I am an English freelance photographer, with a strong passion for the natural world www.wildaslife.com contains examples of my wildlife images, also I have stills images and 16mm film footage of Patagonian Pumas and a rare and endangered species of deer the southern Andean Huemul (hippocamelus bisulcus ) from Chile in the www.arkive.org library in Bristol.

Since moving to Andalusia 5 years ago I have spent considerable time in the Sierr Ctrestallina close to the village of Casares. On the west side of this 4km long sierra is a year round colony of Griffon Vultures, with approximately 80 pairs nesting there. I have been photographing them soaring close to my position on the rock face and have built up considerable portfolio of them soaring close to the face as well as them coming and going from the nests and roosting spots. I have managed to locate 3 nests where I am able to get very very close and in 2 casesenter if I wished.

I believe one of these nests would provide a fantastic opportunity to place a webcam and allow the public to view the feeding of the chick in the nest by the adults. I have observed and photographed this, and have attached a number of jpegs to give you some idea of what could be seen with a camera. The very latest nest I have located allows me to sit in a perfect position looking down into the nest which is only 10ft away from my observation spot.

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Going by the Forum none of you managed to see…

Going by the Forum, none of you managed to see the DENBURY FARM RUT last night. It as only by luck that I managed to see it. The last thing that I do before going up to bed, is to pan the valley camera, to see if there is anything of interest to be seen in the valley. It was quite late, about 12.10am that I first caught a glance of a Red Deer Stag grazing close to a Hind. I initially thought that it was the Stag that we saw a few weeks back, mind you it could well have been. In the distance I saw a couple of sets of eyes that caused me to pan around more. The Stag without me seeing it must have crossed the stream, and as I was panning he came into view just as he was covering a Hind. A little later I also saw a young Stag trying to mate, unfortunately for him the Hind was having none of it. I managed to see at least ten sets of eyes in the distance, some of them from the wood, I should imagine that there were more that were not facing the IR lamps, so it was a fair sized Herd. By about 12.50pm they had all gone into the woods. I managed to record a bit of it, but the view at the end of the valley was poor, my fault as I had not changed a bulb that had blown months back. My lads have also laid armoured cable in the stream, so that we could put another lamp further down the valley. The Electrician is coming at the weekend to wire it up. In the meantime I put a new bulb in the IR lamp that had blown. I think that the lamp is at the right angle, so if the Red Deer return tonight it should be a better view than I did last night.

I don’t know what time that the Deer came to the valley last night. I usually put the picture in picture on with the valley camera going, whilst watching the television, but since Monday when I fitted a camera up in the barn to try to see what had startled me on Sunday, when I went to get the Badger food, I have been watching that camera. ct and Karen asked about the camera. All that I have seen since watching the camera since Monday, is a Field Mouse last night. One of my Lads saw a Rat this afternoon in the barns doorway. It was not a Rat that I saw, it was either a Stoat or Weasel. I will only put the camera on if I see anything. Believe me its like watching paint dry.

My Duck cam is going to be started this evening. I only got the engine and other bits and pieces today. I had to go and buy another two Mallard decoys as I cut the hole in the decoys before I had got the rudder, and it is in the wrong place. Fortunately they were not very expensive. It is going to take me a couple of weeks to get it on to the water working, then I will have to get a very small wireless day night camera. It is not worth buying the camera until I get the Duck moving on the water.