As 2022 draws to a close, the team reflect on some of the highlights and challenges over the past 12 months.

January

We started the year with work continuing on our new block of aviaries for our Flying Team. In January, we were fortunate to have some help from some Kickstart Volunteers from the Museum of East Anglian Rural Life (now the Food Museum). The young people did a fantastic job moving the gravel into the aviaries ready for the new inhabitants to move in.

Kickstart Volunteers helped us move a mountain of gravel into the new aviaries

January also saw a number of starving Buzzards being brought into our Raptor Hospital. Most were young birds who had clearly struggled to find enough food over the colder months. All were provided with a safe place to rest and plenty of food to put on weight. They were also ringed before their release, which helps us to monitor what happens to birds after they have been released

One of the Buzzards we had in our Raptor Hospital

February

In February we announced our chosen Artist for our involvement with the St Elizabeth Hospice Big Hoot Trail. Amy Bourbon’s design “Owl See You In My Dreams” was selected from almost 100 designs to represent us as part of the free art trail which ran throughout the summer holidays around Ipswich.

Amy Bourbon was selected as our artist for the Big Hoot Trail

We also welcomed our first guests in our Hedgehog Hotel, thanks to our partnership with Suffolk Prickles Hedgehog Rescue. Most of our first guests were youngsters from the previous year who had been too small to hibernate. They were given access to the outdoor runs to learn how to be wild hedgehogs before being collected for release near where they had been found.

Our first prickly guests in the Hedgehog Hotel

Susan attended the West Suffolk Home Education Fair in Bury St Edmunds and spoke with lots of new families about our Home Ed courses.

March

With the Pond Block finished and our Flying Team moved in, it was time to get them used to the new routine of flying out of hatches to join in with the Flying Displays.

Woody testing out her entrance onto the Flying Ground from the new Aviary block

For World Book Day we joined with Get Suffolk Reading to hide some free books for our visitors to enjoy.

The stormy weather caused some disruption for wild birds and we received a couple of patients into the Hospital who had sustained injuries after being caught out in the winds. The Kestrel with the broken wing was kept in for a few weeks while his wing healed and he was released back to the farm where he was found.

This Kestrel was injured during the storms, but after a few weeks in our Raptor Hospital, it made a full recovery

Keeper Nick delivered a talk to Stowmarket Lions about our work.

April

We welcomed the Ipswich office of Hurren and Hope in April, who came along to help us for a day of making aviary improvements. They helped to repaint some of the aviaries at SOS2 ready for our peak season.

A group of volunteers repainted some of our aviaries

Just as we were preparing for the Easter Holidays, with all the birds and staff ready to start the Flying Displays again, we received a notifications about a local case of Avian Influenza. This meant that we had to keep our birds grounded to protect them from this deadly disease, and as such, delay the start of our flying season. This was a devastating blow as we had been hoping to start the season on a high with a busy Easter, following two years of challenges due to Covid. However, the new aviary block proved to be invaluable during this time, as it meant we were able to continue flying some of the birds undercover in the corridor area, so they didn’t lose too much in condition.

The falconers also used this time to make some educational behind-the-scenes videos showing the routine of working with the birds and some of the novel enrichment we provided for them. These videos were really well received, especially amongst others in the zoo industry and we received many requests for advice from collections from around the world.

During the Easter Holidays we welcomed Oona the Owl and Ursula from Suffolk Libraries for a storytelling session for visitors.

We were invited to have a stall at the Forum cinema in Thetford alongside the screening of the latest Fantastic Beasts film. Susan was happy to attend and spoke to a number of people about our new Owlreach Volunteer Scheme.

Susan also attended the Spring Open Day at Suffolk Rural College Otley campus. The event was very well attended and Susan spoke to numerous families about what we can offer. Some example activities were available for visitors to have a go at, with the Pellet Detectives activity proving extremely popular - several young visitors spent over half an hour rummaging through to find some bones.

In April, we said a sad goodbye to Darwin, our Chaco Owl. Darwin was a popular bird used for school visits who was enjoying his retirement. Unfortunately his health deteriorated over a number of weeks and despite the best efforts by our team and our consultant vet Dr Elliott Simpson-Brown, we decided not to prolong his suffering.

At the end of the month Susan and Dolly attended the Suffolk Schools Farm and Country Fair. Over 4000 school children from across Suffolk descended on Trinity Park, Ipswich for a fun filled day learning all about country life.

May

In May we highlighted the positive results of our Trainees Dolly and Jade training Fred, one of our Crested Caracaras.

As Bird Flu restrictions eased and our Raptor Hospital reopened, we were inundated with birds needing our help. In just the first week of reopening we received a Long-eared Owlet, Little Owlet, several Tawny owlets and two Kestrels! Later in May, we also helped a Tawny Owl who had got stuck in some garden netting and went on several rescue missions to pick up more Tawny Owlets who had been found in unsafe situations. Many of these pick ups were made by our new team of Owlreach Volunteers.
One of the Tawny Owlets produced a huge pellet upon arrival, so Dolly investigated what it had been eating before needing help. With guidance from Susan, who has dissected countless pellets over the years, they found remains of beetles, shrew and interestingly mole!

A huge pellet produced by a small Owl revealed what mum had been feeding before it needed some help from us

We had a call about an Owl stuck in a pylon, but upon closer investigation, it turned out to be a bird scaring device.

June

In June we welcomed Debenham Guides for a visit and helped them gain their Big Hoot Badge with some fun educational sessions.

Debenham Guides enjoying a flying display

Over the half term we celebrated the Platinum Jubilee and visitors were able to decorate a crown and complete a Royal Trail.

Izzy joined the team as our new Trainee in June. Izzy had been volunteering with us during her degree and did her dissertation on data from our Raptor Hospital.

A team of volunteers from AXA XL Insurance came to help us on a very sunny day. They repainted one of our large aviaries, and got the first coat done in a day, which was a fantastic effort from all involved.

We also heard that we had won the Dobbies Living in the Community Fund, so made plans to replant some areas around the Sanctuary, focussing on the Sensory Garden and Woodland Walk.

Keeper Jennie visited Jayjay at Dobbies Woodbridge to choose some plants for our Sensory Garden

We celebrated the efforts of our Volunteers in June.

We welcomed a new member to the flying team in June. Max the Northern Hawk Owl spent the summer getting used to the sights and sounds of the Sanctuary, while adding his own distinctive call to the mix.

Susan attended the launch event of the Big Hoot Trail in Christchurch Park. As part of the event our volunteers Jan and Sophie were stationed at our Hoot in Ipswich Town Centre with some activity sheets and information for participants of the Hoot Hike to collect.

July

July was a super busy month for our Raptor Hospital, with lots of intakes and releases. We also took in some birds from other rescues who were struggling to find spaces to release them. Working with South Essex Wildlife Hospital to release some Tawny Owlets and Spirit of the Wild to rehabilitate a young Kestrel and Little Owl helps build relationships and can be mutually beneficial, as we never know when we might need assistance ourselves.

A young Kestrel which was found in need of help

Thanks to funding from charitable trusts, we were able to build several new hack pens this summer to assist with the release of birds. This month included two Barn Owlets, two Little Owlets and nine Tawny Owlets who were all ringed before release.

The dry weather and extreme heat caused problems for some birds, and the young Little Owls we had in this month were all found to have been eating insects, which are not particularly nutritional for a growing owl!

We also embarked on a multiple bird rescue mission locally after a group of young Kestrels were found outside a local chip shop. Jess was able to capture two of the three and brought them into our care until they were well enough to be released somewhere more appropriate.

July also saw a ringing recovery from a Buzzard found as a road casualty last month on a local road. The female Buzzard had mild concussion when she was picked up by Dr Hugh Hanmer, who was on his way to the Sanctuary to ring some birds before release. After a few days to recover, she was released in a field about a mile away from where she had been found. Unfortunately, a week later several staff saw a dead Buzzard exactly where she had originally been picked up on their way to work. Jess was able to pull over and check and confirmed that it was our female from her ring number.

Checking the ring number confirmed that the Buzzard found dead on a local road had been released nearby

We had to close for a few days during the extreme heat wave and vastly reduced the time that our birds and staff were exposed to direct sun.

August

August was a quieter month in the Raptor Hospital, which was just as well because we were getting ready for the summer holidays!

We celebrated the Commonwealth Games with some sporty enrichment for our birds and animals.

The Meerkats climbed the podium to celebrate the Commonwealth Games

While the falconers and keepers did a fantastic job educating our visitors with our flying displays, Susan attended several local community events to raise awareness about what we do, as well as delivering talks and sessions to Libraries, community groups and becoming involved with Get Suffolk Reading events.

Bramble wowed visitors throughout the summer

The extreme heat continued to cause havoc and we had to cancel flying displays and courses for several days during the summer holidays

With the summer almost at an end, Susan and her partner Hugh, plus their two collies, completed the Hoot Hike in Ipswich. This sponsored walk of over 8km (because they made some detours to see additional Hoots not on the trail) took them through the streets and parks of Ipswich, and Susan managed to raise £150 for St Elizabeth Hospice.

Susan with her collies visited 42 of the 50 Hoots as part of the Hoot Hike sponsored walk.

September

September started with International Vulture Awareness Day. This year, Susan ran a fundraiser to raise much needed financial support for Kartong Bird Observatory in The Gambia, who are monitoring critically endangered Hooded Vultures in the region. With support from the team, who got crafty and made some fabulous Vulture themed prizes, the draw raised £90.

Jack and Rose with one of the prizes in our Vulture Day Raffle

The following weekend we hosted another successful British Sign Language Day with our friend Natalie. We welcomed over 40 deaf visitors and their families for this special day.

Unfortunately, Avian Influenza returned to the area and we took the difficult decision to stop our flying displays at the end of September, rather than at the end of October as usual.

October

October saw more local cases of Bird Flu, which meant that we had to temporarily close our Raptor Hospital to new admissions for a short time.

We cleared our back row of weatherings to open up this area. Eventually we plan on building new aviaries here, but for now it’s been planed with a wildflower mix which will encourage pollinators next spring and summer.

Jay and volunteer Phil dismantling the old weatherings

Suffolk Rural College sent a team of students to complete a Work Skills Placement with us throughout October. The group helped with a number of different tasks, including gardening and weeding, moving woodchips to the Woodland Walk pathways and clearing the area of the old weatherings.

Our animals and birds enjoyed some Halloween themed enrichment over the half term break.

Our Vultures enjoyed disembowelling Frankenstein

Our Big Hoot raised £1,800 for St Elizabeth Hospice in their Auction, helping to raise a total of £163,590!

November

Thanks to a new marquee to allow us to assess incoming patients without taking them into the Hospital, we were able to reopen our Hospital and saw a number of interesting cases. A young Kestrel was found caught up in some decorations in a local community woodland. He was also covered in ticks, which unfortunately gave him an infection. After a short stay to make sure there was no lasting damage, he was released back where he was found.

The young Kestrel had an infection from a tick bite which needed treatment before release

We also had a number of pale or silver coloured Tawny Owls admitted. We usually get the gingery brown variety so it’s been unusual to get quite a few around the same time.

We were grateful to Babergh Council for lending us a hand to do some work on the old fox enclosure in preparation for new arrivals. They removed all of the bark and slate chippings so that a new substrate could be laid, and repainted the indoor area.

Our Keepers Beckie, Jennie and Nick and falconer Dolly attended an Animal Training workshop run by Shaping Behaviour and hosted by Banham Zoo. The workshop was interactive and informative and gave out staff plenty of ideas for training methods to use on our own birds and animals.

Our Keepers attended an Animal Training workshop

Susan attended the first Suffolk Coast conference since 2019 and had an informative day learning more about the tourism industry in Suffolk.

Towards the end of the month we had our first Chimney rescue of the year. A Tawny Owl fell down the flue of a log burning stove, but thankfully the chimney had recently been cleaned so the bird wasn’t too sooty. After a short stay in the Hospital it was returned to the garden and released.

Cinders the Tawny Owl was found in a log burner

December

As the cold weather hit, a number of birds were brought into the Hospital, including a couple of young Buzzards that were found starving and struggling to fly.

Jess and Jay spent a few days re-establishing our nestbox project. They visited as many as they could to see how many are still standing or need some maintenance before the next breeding season.

Jay inspecting one of the Owl nest boxes

Throughout December we welcomed a temporary team member in the form of Joiz the Helpful Elf. Joiz spent the month helping with a number of tasks, including some maintenance and admin work, as well as helping with our Hedgehogs, Raptor Hospital and making enrichment for the animals and birds.

2022 - A Year in Review