Tilgate Nature Centre in Crawley is a nature reserve for protected and endangered species and is home to over 100 different animals ranging from reindeer and ravens to frogs and pheasants.  It’s surrounded by lakes and gardens and lots of woodland and bridleways, far too much for one cat and his two-legged friend to explore in one day.  I don’t think John would have the stamina!  So we concentrated on the nature park and the fluffy, spikey, feathered and scaly specimens to be found within it.  The beauty of nature is that it comes in so many different shapes and sizes like the spiny-tailed iguana who sat watching me from his branch.  His eyes set on each side of his head as opposed to mine that face the front so I could only see one of his eyes and it was fixed on me.  I started to sway back and forth, shifting my weight from side to side then dipping down and popping up to try in order to throw him off but that eye seemed to rotate in every direction and never once lost its target!  I concluded that lizards can stare out anyone and accepted defeat.  In an attempt to help me get over my downfall in the ogling competition with that scaly scoundral, the keeper told me that we had more in common than I might think.  For example, we both had four clawed feet and a long tail and we both use body language and postures to define territory and resolve disputes.  That all sounds like hard work to me and I prefer to put my energies into ensuring my daily dietary, play and petting needs are met by using whatever unique moves I have at my disposal including my irresistible purr and signature tail flick.

The sow in the field was busy feeding her piglets and every time I counted them there seemed to be more.  I had 9 at the last count and these weren’t the only babies to have arrived in recent times at the park.  Four pups had been born in the meerkat enclosure and were proving very popular with visitors thanks to their squeaky and mischievous natures, running around pinching food from each other and chasing the grown-ups.  I had to admire their vitality which reminded me of myself in my younger days!  The Asian short-clawed otters had a similar care-free outlook on life and seemed to be endlessly having fun, scurrying across their logs and splashing around in the water.  The other babies we saw were the pygmy goat kids running around their rock pile and butting heads as though practising for when they are big and deciding who will be the alpha.  And judging by the romantic behaviour of the tortoises, we might see some cute tortoise babies being hatched over the next few weeks.  I noticed the keepers had filled their bowls with extra figs, dandelions and sweet-peppers probably to give them the strength required to bring up a family.

Petrie the one-eyed magpie cannot be released back into the wild because she doesn’t have the all her survival skills in tact so she lives with two friendly owls and passes her time whistling to anyone who talks to her and playing with her pink ball.  The keepers fill the pink feeder with worms, leaves or pieces of fruit for her to roll around until the treats come out and she hops off to one of her secret stashes to hide her hoard when she thinks no one is looking.  As we headed past Cinnamon and Nutmeg the Shetland ponies I caught a whiff of cat and I followed the scent until I found Kenya, a serval originally from the African savanna and now considered vulnerable due to habitat loss and persecution.  Kenya was so busy rubbing his cheeks around his enrichment area and searching for the mousey morsels left in his den by the keeper that it took a while for him to notice me.  With his powerful gaze in my direction, I puffed out my chest and tail so he’d have some respect for his small domesticated cousin looking up at him.  Then I realised we were not so different after all as he pottered around his enclosure and settled down in a sunny spot for a nap.

Bears and tortoises hibernate in the winter but they’re not the only ones.  Shad the Cat has been lying dormant over the winter period although obviously not hibernating in the true sense of the word.  Real hibernation involves a sleep so deep that body temperature and heart rate would decrease and I would not be required to eat or eliminate body waste – 2 things essential to my daily routine!  Since I’ve been inactive over the last couple of cold wet months, what better way to celebrate the coming of Spring than with new life in the form of little lambs as they begin their journey from carefree folly to maturity and beyond.

Gaston Farm in Slindon opens to the public in April for lambing season and gives everyone a chance to get up close to the sheep and see the lambs being born.  John and I arrived just after one ewe had given birth to two little babies who were nuzzling their mum while their wobbly legs held them up.  She was in what I called the ‘birthing barn’ which was a warm dry outhouse containing all the pregnant mums and sectioned off areas for the sheep who were about to lamb so that they could have their offspring safely.  The shepherd told me that ewes will normally lamb without any need for assistance but sadly a few don’t make it through the birthing process resulting in orphans.  Most sheep have two lambs but some have three or one, so the orphans and any lambs from a group of three are fostered by ewes with only one in order to make sure all the lambs have a mum and to minimise the risk of some mums working too hard with three lambs while others have too much milk for just one.  It was all very magical and inspiring until things got icky when the shepherd took the afterbirth that had been expelled and gave it to his dog, demonstrating why his nickname was the Grumpy Shepherd!

We took a tractor and trailer ride out to the fields where the sheep live on the South Downs.  It was bumpy along those country lanes and every time John got the camera lined up for a great shot the tractor driver would pull forward causing John to bounce up and down so it was difficult to get the camera steady.  The driver said that the sheep in the fields had been moved there away from close supervision in the barns as their lambs had got stronger. Each ewe was then painted with a coloured number to indicate how many lambs they had produced.  A green 27 was the 27^th sheep to have one lamb, a blue 15 was the 15^th sheep to have 3 lambs and a red 1 was the very first sheep to have twins this season.  We caught a glimpse of this special set of twins just before the tractor heaved the trailer back towards the farm.  By the time I hopped off the trailer I had a skip in my step like the Spring lambs cavorting in the fields and was determined that I would take a moment every day to appreciate the daffodils and bumble bees and warm sun on my belly.  Goodbye winter and hello new life.  Time to stock up on anti-histamines and sun-cream ready for John’s usual summer of sneezing!

Gaston Farm