If you're looking for an animal experience as a gift for an animal lover, or you want to treat yourself, take a look at gift experience company Into the Blue 

They have a range of animal experiences to choose from and you can get 20% off with the discount code ITBCUPID20  It's valid to midnight on 14 February 2023 on experiences up to £250.00 - there are some excluded products but very few, so make the most of it! 

There are lots of falconry experiences to choose from
- there are locations around the UK and they start at £24.50
Experience a meeting and handling a bird of prey
and even flying them to your gloved hand!

Try a bee keeping experience!
They start at £35.00
Find out all about the art of keeping bees and making honey!




There are a number of animal-related photography experiences
- some are not animal related and some are online.  From £20.00

Have a sheepdog experience in West Yorkshire
for £85.00
Have a full day with Border Collies
Learn how to handle and train the dogs
Learn about farming, sheep and sheepdogs
Shepherd a small flock of sheep

You could go Alpaca Walking in Warwickshire 
from £7.50 for a child, £13.50 for an adult.
Meet the alpaca herd near Atherstone
and head off on a guided walk with your alpaca!

There's Sheep Trekking in Somerset
from £25.00
Meet and greet the friendly sheep and give them snacks
Lead a sheep on a stroll across fields and through woodland

There's Ancient Trails Pony Walking in Dorset
from £49.00
This is a great way to discover Dorset, 
on a guided pony walk with a pony by your side!




Meet the Meerkats in Oxfordshire
£40.00 for two people
Learn all about the Meerkats' lives as a family
and get to feed them inside their enclosure

Click here to see all the Animal Experience Days and Gifts - and don't forget to use the discount code ITBCUPID20 for your 20% off!

Great news!  We’ve got an exclusive code for you from Virgin Experience Days!

The code will give you 15% off products on their website (except for the excluded products), and not only that, it can be applied to special offers and 2 for 1s!  How fantastic is that?!

The code SLSJQNDS gives you 15% off at Virgin Experience Days*

Virgin Experience Days have a wide variety of animal experiences so you can really the most of the offer.

With big cats, horses, farm animals, zookeeper, wildlife photography, bee keeping and animal walking experiences, there’s lots of choice

Meet and Feed the Meerkats for Two at Millets Wildside, Oxfordshire

The animal walking experiences cover an interesting range of animals, including huskies, donkeys, pigs, alpacas, sheep (yes honestly, this is in Warwickshire) and llamas, so you’ll be spoilt for choice.

Have a Big Cat Encounter in Kent

And they’ve also got experiences with meerkats, reptiles, a tiger encounter in Devon, keeper for the day, raccoons, penguins, giraffes, kinkajous (in Kent), porcupines (in Kent) and bears and kangaroos.

They’ve also got over 30 falconry experiences, some are more bird species specific than others e.g. one may focus on owls or eagles, another may look at birds of prey

Don't forget, there's 15% off with the exclusive code SLSJQNDS; it's valid to 31.03.23 and site wide (apart from excluded products)

Canter off to Virgin Experience Days to see their animal experiences!

*Does not apply to excluded products

Those lovely people at Green People (who produce organic beauty products for all the family) have a great gift set for your dog!

It's called the allPaws Fetch Me a Bath Dog Gift Set, and it includes:

• allPaws Scent Free Dog Shampoo 200ml
• allPaws Wild Mint Dog Shampoo 200ml
• A natural rubber ball

It's normally £30 but it's on offer for £20, saving you £10.  However, these are selling fast, so don't delay - race over to Green People here!

Those fabulous people at Garden Wildlife Direct have some fly away fantastic offers on throughout the year, with everything you need for your garden birds and wildlife!

And they always have lots of lovely offers on, perfect when we are all trying to help wildlife and yet make our money go further. 

Garden Wildlife Direct has seed mixes for spring, summer, autumn and winter, with different brands including Peckish (as seen on the TV) adverts), Wildlife World, Gardeman and Garden Wildlife Direct's own brand.   

There's all sorts of bird food, from seeds to sunflower hearts, suet balls to food for wildlife.   They've got sunflower heart/seeds, Millet seeds, bird food bundles and starter kits for those of you who want to start feeding the birds in your garden. 

They've got suet fat balls, suet blocks, suet coconut shells nad suet pallets, plus a range of feeders for mealworms, ground feeders, sunflowers and seeds.

And of course you can get a full range of accessories such as window sticker alerts, bird tables, bird baths, nesting boxes, organments for your garden and things to store your bird goodies in.

This All Seasons Complete Dining Station
gives your birds a one-stop shop (or cafe!) to feed from
- it doesn't come with bird food, that's extra.

If you have or want to encourage ducks, swans, hedgehogs, squirrels, chickcn and poultry, then they have food for those animals as well, plus bee houses and insect hotels. 

If you have squirrels who keep pinching the food meant for the birds,
try a squirrel proof bird feeder

This is a great chance to get stocked up with essentials for the wildlife in your garden, be they birds, or bats or hedgehogs. squirrels or bees, so fly off to Garden Wildlife Direct for more information .

It's not long before Valentine's Day arrives - but why wait to show your pooch how much you love him or her?

Those lovely folk at Pooch & Mutt have launched their Valentine's Day Limited
Edition Love-ly Lamb Meaty Treats!  

Pooch & Mutt have created an range of natural meals treats and supplements that both does good and tastes good giving dogs the ingredients they need to boost their mood and behaviour and their  physical health.

Now, they've got a couple of discount codes* for you.

There's 20% off with the code LOVE (what else?!) or if you spend over £60.00 with them, you can get 25% off with the code HEART.

Go on - treat the ones you love so much....

Visit their website here

*They do have some exclusions.  

Those lovely people at BuyaGift have given visitors from this website an exclusive  discount code!

There's Piggy Pet and Play for Two at Kew Little Pigs
A chance to play with and groom the piglets and micro pigs!
£49.99

You can enjoy 15% off across the site and they have 175 animal experiences you can choose from.  There's everything from alpacas to piggies, horses to big cats, birds of prey and meerkats, penguins and owls, zookeeping and monkeys.

AHW2023

Feed the Capybaras for Two at Hobbledown Heath Hounslow
Enter the capybara enclosure and feed the capybaras some treats!
£69.00

Family Adventure at Alpaca Annie
This is a meet and greet experience for 2 adults and 2 children!
£29.00

This is a great chance to get out and about, to meet animals you wouldn't usually meet, and to get some fresh air.  There's nothing like a bit of animal magic to brighten your day!

BuyaGift are giving visitors from this site 15% off across their website (some products are excluded) until 31st December 2023, with the code AHW2023.

Canter off to BuyaGift here!

It’s frrrrrrrreeezing outside, and I have to confess to being very glad that I can watch Winterwatch in the warmth of my living room, my paws warming themselves on a hot brew, a woolly hat on my head. 

(When I say the warmth of my living room, I mean that it’s probably slightly warmer there than it is outside.)

And it’s great to see Winterwatch is back (it started on Tuesday 17 January on BBC2 at 8pm and runs on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday at the same time for starters).

In the first programme, Michaela Strachan and Chris Packham are back in Norfolk keeping an eye out for breeding grey seals, and uncovering the birds coming to our garden, and how we can support them.  (Enter the opportunity to remind ourselves that the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch takes place from 27^th to 29^th January 2023 – take part and help the RSPB help wildlife.)

Iolo Williams and Gillian Burke were exploring the urban ecosystem of Edinburgh, searching out otters and migrating eels and looking at the wild badgers at Edinburgh Zoo.

Mountain hares, jackdaws and wading birds, and a starling murmuration should also feature.

Oh, and the Mindfulness Moments are back – when we can all enjoy 90 seconds of nature without music or presenters making a sound.   Why not continue these 90 seconds of Mindfulness Moments during the week?

Find out how you can help winter wildlife here.  There’s plenty that we can all do.  Why not have a go at the quiz to test your knowledge on the UK’s birds of prey?

Visit the Winterwatch website here.

There’s a new series of Serentegi starting on Sunday 15^th January 2023.  It is on BBC1 and the series looks at the real life stories of the national park in the north of Tanzania and the narrator is actress Adjoa Andor. 

The series highlights the plight of the animals – it doesn’t flinch from the realities of the natural world – and they were filmed for 1,000 days.

We start on the “kopje”, rocky outcrops, where we find baboon Bakari and his troop.  And Bakari has to see off a challenge from a rival baboon, leading to a chase and a fight. 

And the lioness Kali has found refuge in a new pride and she’s had a litter of cubs!   They run into a nest with eagle owl chicks – the parents attack and lioness Kali is knocked off the kopje – will she get back to the kopje?

There’s also amazing footage of hyenas – Zalika the hyena finds new opportunities for hunting at the stunning flamingo lake.  But catching them is another matter!  Duma the cheetah cub tries his luck with the flamingos as well, trying to be more independent from his family.  

Serengeti Story: Life and Science in the World's Greatest Wildlife Region 
available from Foyles 

And we meet mongoose Utani, who’s job is to act as a babysitter for a new pup and teach her all he knows.  Unfortunately, he oversleeps on his first day!  And then he meets Duma and the cheeetahs – calling team mongoose to come to his rescue!!

Birds of East Africa: Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi
available from Foyles

There’s a raging wildfire as well – how will the animals cope??  Will they survive?   I am praying for them already.

Visit Serengeti’s programme website here.

Not bought a calendar for 2023 yet? 

Those lovely folk at Zooplus.co.uk have a lovely 2023 calendar with some very special star models – their customers’ pets!   There’s plenty of space to write down all your appointments and the calendar features cuddling cats, a dog in daffodils and a hedgehog appearance!

Get your free copy while you can with the coupon code ZOO-2023 – it’s valid on all orders of £19.00 or more while stocks last, or until 31.01.2023.  You can only use one coupon per order.

We’ve used Zooplus lots of times in the past and they’ve been great to deal with – they have some fantastic offers and products for all sorts of pets, from cats and dogs to birds and small pets - everything you could want for that special member of the family!  And they sell all major brands of pet supplies at great prices!

Dig up a route to Zooplus here.

Miaow for now, woof woof!

Well, miaow miaow!  Calling all cats!

Cats Protection’s National Cat Awards 2023 are now open and here’s your opportunity to get involved, dip your paw in and take part!

The awards are full of amazing tales of devotion, courage and companionship. 

There are four categories – would your cat be right for one, or do you know of a cat who would fit the bill?

Public vote will select the winters from the four categories before an independent panel names the National Cat of the Year at a ceremony in London on 17^th July 2023.

Find out about the Cats Protection National Awards 2023 here
Image © Cats Protection

You need to nominate your puss by noon on Friday 24 February in one of these categories (quoting from Cats Protection’s email about it):

• Cat Colleagues – celebrating cats who bring joy to the workplace, or make working from home a pleasure
• Family Furr-ever – recognising cats that make a family complete, whether they’re a child’s best friend or a comforting sofa buddy
• Moggy Marvels - Jaw-dropping stories of survival, heroism and companionship in the cat world
• Social Star - Paying tribute to those fame-hungry felines who spread joy on social media

To enter the National Cat Awards, add your cat’s details to the entry form.   T&Cs are here.

There's plenty we can all do to help Cats Protection help cats, whether we have a cat or not, including volunteering  - visit their website and have a good rummage round to see what you can do to lend a paw.