Lotherton Hall, March 2017

Earlier this month (March 17) I had a business meeting to attend in Lotherton Hall, just off the A1 near Leeds.  I'd never heard of it before so I googled it and was pleasantly surprised to see that it is an Edwardian house and country estate owned by Leeds City Council and open to the public.

Not only that, but it had a tea shop, and a gift shop, and gardens and, would you believe, a bird garden!

I asked Sue if she fancied a day out, and of course she said yes, so off we went to explore. The day started badly when we were held up for over an hour because of a crash on the A19 near Sunderland, but we got there only half an hour late for my meeting.

After the meeting, I changed into my 'proper' clothes (jeans, boots, jumper) and joined Sue in the gardens.  Unfortunately, there wasn't much to see in the gardens at that time of year, but then we happened upon the bird garden.

Bird garden? I think not - it was more like a wildlife park for birds. I couldn't believe how many birds they (about 200 species), and from all over the world.  There was even a huge enclosure for a couple of Andean condors. They were magnificent (though fiendishly difficult to photograph with a mobile phone).

The highlight of my day was watching the ducks playing in one of the ponds - which you should be able to see in this video I hope:

Enough wittering - have a look at the photos I did manage to take. There really were some beautiful birds, though my favourite was the grumpy little Red-billed hornbill.  Enjoy.