Update on maternity visit at the petting zoo.

Hey, hey, finally: I thought this morning when I read the happy news on Facebook that the 2nd alpaca was born in the animal park. I was expecting it last week anyway. And that was true, it was born Tuesday 17 July. But after last month's experience, the caregivers kept it quiet for a while. With this mare the birth did not go without problems. But this time the problem was not with the foal, but with the mother. First, the afterbirth did not want to come, and then she had the problem that the uterus came out. My daughter told me that this is also common in sheep. During her internship at a sheep farmer she experienced it several times.

But luckily, mother and daughter are now walking healthy and well in the meadow with the fallow deer. Not yet near the stallion, because she wanted to cover her immediately again. Because an alpaca has about a year's gestation period.

It's a beautiful foal, very curious, because it came to me at an unguarded moment to see what kind of strange creature I was. They don't let themselves be stroked and if you don't have something delicious you can't get too close. (Mothers loves apples very much told the animal carer.) They are very friendly and quiet.

Of course there was much more to see and because there were no other visitors I got a tour.

Just this morning there was also a young fallow deer discovered. It was a bit of a search, but indeed it was hidden in the middle of the grass. I was able to take a picture without too much backlight, when it felt that I was getting too close and spurted through it.

There were also young ducks, which they kept well inside, because so many have already been eaten. The seagulls are on it. A fox comes by sometimes. Those little down are, of course, a nice snack.

What was also very special was this 3rd laying of the peasant swallows. The animal keeper took a photo of the nest up close. He lives a floor higher than me.

In the peacock family, 7 little ones had crawled out of the egg. The parents quickly led the chicks away from us. That's why I only made a video, on which you can still see them a little.

The black swan felt that he had to perform strict, of course we came way too close. I could take a nice picture of him.

So slowly it was time to go home. The animal park closed again and it was way too hot to be outside for a long time. I got a big bunch of peacock feathers to do something at work. And I carefully cycled home with that.