Wildwood Trust: Wildwood April Newsletter

Newsletter - April 2018

Welcome to the April edition of the Wildwood newsletter and the beginning of the nice weather! We have some cute new babies, some improvements at the park to mention and some great conservation news.

If you wish to know more about any of our stories or Wildwood in general, then please feel free to email us at info@wildwoodtrust.org

Thank you for your continued support. We'll see you again soon!

Wolf pack

Wildwood are enormously proud to announce the opening of Britain’s most innovative wolf woodland enclosure. A unique two-level woodland feature allows visitors to venture into the heart of the wolf pack’s lair and experience what it is like to share the woodland with the wolves. With immersive 360-degree panoramic views, accessible to all, thousands of families can join the wolves in one of Britain’s most engaging animal experiences. We also hope to soon welcome the pitter patter of tiny paws and the start of Wildwood’s new wolf pack.

Baby boom

1. We’re celebrating the birth of a new wallaby joey to the park. The joey has only just left its mother’s pouch and can be seen exploring in the walkthrough. We have yet to determine the sex, but so far it appears to be very strong and healthy.

2. The beginning of March welcomed the birth of five baby rabbits to our doe, Truffle. Did you know baby rabbits are actually called kittens?

3. Our Soay sheep have recently welcomed a new lamb, born this April.

Pigs in space

Our younger wild boar pair, Sherwood and Ash, have moved to an enclosure next to the bison. The new area hosts plenty of opportunity for foraging a bountiful amount of food and will give their old enclosure time to rest and grow up new plants and shoots. We will be regularly rotating the boar between the two enclosures to reap the benefits of new floral growth and to enrich the animals.

Bears are back in town

After a second successful winter torpor, our bears are back in their large enclosure for the summer. Come see them foraging, relaxing in their pool and doing bear things! The bear bridge viewing platform is also open.

New shop website opens

We’ve been working hard on a new shop website, which is now live at wildwoodtrust.shop

Adoptions - Wildwood animal adoptions last for one year and are the perfect gift for any animal lover. Each adoption helps support our work to save British Wildlife. We have various different levels of adoption available to suit all occasions and budgets, and you can choose from any one of our animals.

Experiences – We currently offer bear experiences, photo days and guided tours on our website. We’ll have Arctic fox experiences available later in the year and have some other great animal experiences in the pipeline.

Shop – This is where you can buy items unique to Wildwood - Top Trumps, Hoody Bears, Prints and Vouchers.

Courses - Wildwood Trust offers a range of training courses and workshops throughout the year catering for complete beginners and amateur naturalists through to wildlife professionals. We cover a variety of topics ranging from species ecology, conservation and handling to outdoor crafts, foraging and permaculture.

Find out more

Wolf artwork

Ramsgate artist Donna Langridge helped the park celebrate the opening of the enclosure by donating two stunning pieces of custom made pyrography.

The 36-year-old spent more than 90 hours painstakingly burning each individual line onto wood to capture the beauty of Wildwood's wolves, Odin and Nuna. Both artworks are on display in the new wolf platform.

Road and path upgrade

As a conservation charity, Wildwood is dedicated to educating people about British wildlife and wild spaces and uses its ancient woodland setting to achieve this goal. Making our woodland park easily navigable for visitors whilst being sensitive to the natural environment can be challenging; heavy rain causes many pathways around the park to become severely waterlogged and muddy, making some areas almost impassable. Cold weather can also make other paths uneven and difficult to navigate – particularly for those with additional mobility needs or pushchairs. We will be upgrading the road to the car park and pathways throughout the park this year and apologise in advance for any inconvenience.

Conservation grazing

Some of our wild konik ponies have been moved to an exciting new rewilding project. The Cambrian Wildwood Project aims to rewild thousands of acres of overgrazed Welsh mountain land. Taking ecologically destroyed land and restoring it back to its original wildwood status. With lite grazing from wild horses, trees will come back with complex wetlands and open areas. This ground breaking project could be the start of a rewilded Britain and we will be doing more to help our partners achieve their aims.

Find out more

Dormouse reintroduction

Over 20 adorable dormice have been released at a secret location where they have gone extinct in the UK. Each year Wildwood supplies captive-bred dormice for the release programme and, as studbook holder for the species, selects and pairs up the animals for release, thus ensuring the strongest genetic mix for future generations. Wildwood Trust is the UK’s leading charity in captive breeding dormice for release into the wild to help to combat this decline and have bred hundreds of dormice over the 15 years.

We need your help!

To help with our conservation aims, our keepers are always in need of a variety of items. We're looking for old pillow cases and towels, 2ft x 3ft concrete slabs and a trailer. If you have any of these spare and ready to be thrown out, please get in touch.

Purrfect New Home

Our breeding pair of Scottish wildcats have now moved to their new enclosure opposite the Eagle Owls. The enclosure comes complete with a quiet, off show birthing pen for when and if kittens arrive. Carna and RJ are both growing in confidence in their new surroundings, already sleeping on their platforms and boxes.

Reintroducing stamps

Royal Mail’s NEW Reintroduced Species stamps have been released and subsequently a very special Wildwood collection pack produced by our friends at Buckingham Covers.

As well as being a great collector's item that includes the full set of 6 stamps, Wildwood will receive £1 from every sale which will go towards our ongoing beaver reintroduction work.

You can buy now or find out more in our shop or by clicking the button.

Find out more