With the news in January of us having to close our sister site, Sandwich Wildlife Park I wanted to give you an update on the new residents who have moved over to now call Wingham Wildlife Park their home.
BIRDS
We have had a move around with some of our penguins and have been joined from Sandwich by Dougie, Mr Ashcroft, Lucie, Dave, and Scofield.
Dougie has a green band on the left flipper and a red band on the right.
Mr Ashcroft has a blue band on the left flipper.
Lucie has a black band on the left and a green band on the right.
Dave has a white band on the right.
Scofield has a green band on the left and a blue band on the right flipper.
They have all settled well and, with the transfer of some of our original penguins from Wingham, we have a few new pairs starting to bond.
Joining the bird section, we also have the arrival back of our dusky and chattering lorikeets who have taken up residence next to the vervet monkeys at the primate block. These two became inseparable in the tropical house when they were last living at Wingham but were causing a few problems with our breeding group of rainbow lorikeets so were moved to Sandwich.
CARNIVORES
The carnivore section has increased their species by having the raccoon dogs and the arctic wolves join them. The wolves, Shadow and Ghost have settled in fantastically well and are even enjoying the occasional swim in their enclosure. They have been receiving training for coming over to the keepers, so we are able to give medication easily by hand, which is great when it comes to giving oral medicines such as wormer.
The raccoon dogs have always been shy and the best place to see them is later in the afternoons when they start to venture around their enclosure. They are currently going through their annual moult so are looking a little scruffy with a lot of fur being shed in their house.
MAMMALS
Nancy the porcupine has been settling into her family after having to been hand reared by Markus. It is taking a bit of time for her to get into the group fully, which is what we expected as she still has to realise that she is a porcupine and not a little person. But she is now spending the entire night with them and has not had to be separated away from them for several weeks now.
Our Northern Luzon Cloud Rats, Akira and Faye, have also returned to us and have settled back into their old enclosure.
The meerkats and Cusimanse groups have now settled into their new families with the meerkats now receiving crate training, which is great to see.
We also have had a shift around with our goats, with Stan and a couple of females leaving to pastures new and having the two younger female goats, Valerie and Dorine arrive up from Sandwich.
PRIMATES
A new species for the primate section is the pygmy marmoset. Harry and Ron are housed in the tropical house in the enclosure which can be found in the middle along the walkway. They are fairly shy but can be spotted if you patiently wait and watch through the window. It is amazing how quickly they can move and hide.
We also welcome back our bachelor group of bush babies and our black tailed marmosets, father and daughter, Billy and Eve. Billy already has quite a reputation with the keepers from when he was last at Wingham as he likes to jump on them and nip their ears, he is very cheeky.
Upstairs in the chimp house we have also welcomed back Sid the sloth and Terry the tamandua who have returned back into their old enclosure after it was re-vamped before their arrival. Once we are able to allow people back into the buildings again we will be continuing our Sloth and Tamandua experiences which were originally held at Sandwich.
REPTILES & AMPHIBIANS
Lastly, we have two new species in the Reptile House, a veiled chameleon and three cane toads.
If you would like to see where some of the other animals have gone from Sandwich Wildlife Park please check out some of the Facebook live streams.
