Seaview Wildlife Encounter Isle of Wight

 September 2011

  We had decided to take a short break at Warners Holiday hotel, situated in Bembridge, on the Isle of Wight. Primarily to take part in some indoor bowls, but we also like ballroom or sequence dancing, and this type of short break appealed to us enormously. Finding ourselves at a loose end one morning we decided to use our bus passes to take a trip to Ryde, then on to the Seaview Wildlife park. 

  The wildlife encounter park is situated near the coastline with some beautiful panoramic sea views. 
At the entrance to the park there is a kiosk that sells bird food, which enables one to hand feed the bird and animal life. I would strongly recommend this, as there is nothing quite like having friendly wild life eating out of your hand. 

  A map of the park, and a programme of the times when the various inhabitants are due to be fed, is provided at the entrance. It was worth our while making our way to the various venues, as a very informative talk on the particular bird or animal that was getting fed, was provided by the keeper.

Feeding time for the penguins

  The penguins are great fun to watch and the keeper handed out some fish to the willing watchers to hand feed them. One penguin, who went by the name of "Humphrey," was spoilt by all and sundry, as he had been born slightly deformed and had trouble competing with the others for food.
  These are Humboldt penguins from Peru and Chile, and sadly they are now an endangered species due to habitat disturbance, and human exploitation. 

  The variety of wildlife and birds roaming around free in the park here is incredible, and it is lovely to stroll around getting so close to the many different species on display. I did enquire from one of the keepers if they had trouble from foxes and other predators. Unfortunately the obvious answer was forthcoming, especially during the breeding season, when the birds eggs and young chicks are at risk. 

I made this slideshow presentation to show the very wide variety of wildlife that is always on display with the most part roaming free in the park, this creates a wonderful hands on experience, and many photographic opportunities. 

  We then headed for the Wallaby enclosure, where the resident Wallabies were about to be fed. There are a large number of Bennetts Wallabies in residence here originating from South East Australia, and a favourite part of their diet is dried pelleted grass, which the visitors can feed to them by hand. 
  When we visited, the number of Wallabies in residence, included three pure white albinos, this is not such a rare event when they are in captivity, but albino Wallabies do not survive in the wild. The albinos require special care, and  protection from the sun is essential. All of the wallabies were very friendly and obviously used to being hand fed by strangers.

Wallabies and Flamingos

  We also visited and photographed some of the very pretty pink Flamingos. There are three varieties in residence here, the Chilean, the Lesser and the Caribbean. Seaview wildlife park have been breeding the Chilean variety for a number of years now, and they supply other parks and zoos with breeding stock.