Animals in film

A couple of weeks ago I did three film jobs in a row and thought I'd make a quick post about it to illustrate how varied working with animals in film can be.

Monday was for a BBC programme, Natures Weirdest Events, so I was lucky enough to work with one of my childhood heros, Chris Packham, while he presented a walking catfish, lobster, ducklings and giant snails, to illustrate some unusual news stories from the natural world. Fish jobs are always hard work as they are nearly always up several flights of stairs with no elevator (sods law), and to keep the aquatic animals happy, we must bring with us all the pretreated water we require, especially in the case of marine animals.

Tuesday saw me taking a lot of rats into London to the set of a comedy/magic/quiz panel show presented by Matt Edmondson. the rats had to wait inside what we call in the game a "fear box"- unwitting contestant puts hand into box and has to guess what's inside or retrieve some object, a la "I'm a celebrity". It's these types of jobs that we have to undertake with great care as they are high stress risk to the animals and high bite risk to the contestants, so we use experienced animals and high levels of control in order to keep everyone safe. We also popped a rat down a chaps leotard which went really well and was very funny. The rat was well practised and performed exactly as I thought he would,  crawling around a bit and then poking his head out of the top to have a look around, very cute.

On Wednesday I took our bullfinch Rosco to the set of a feature film about the life of Stephen Hawking. The finch had to hop about in a certain spot on the outside of a hospital window. Luckily I'd always been on a recce a few weeks previous and had instructed the team to net off the outside area of the window, so I was able to safely work with the bird from the window ledge inside a safe area so I could cue Rosco and get the shots we needed.

Quite a nice selection of jobs I thought, showing some of the variety of work we do with our animals.

I'm aliiiive!!

The alligator swim happened! It was about as fantastic as any experience can be, a little scary at first what with it being a different environment and style of handling animals than I am used to, but once I got in the swing of things (and Battle the alligator got used to me) it really was incredible. I feel so privileged to have had such an awesome predator tolerate me in his own environment, and the support of my friends, colleagues and family, and even friends of friends, in supporting me in my fund raising challenge has been fantastic. It's not too late to give support to the crocodile conservations charity I chose... Follow the instructions below!

It was a pleasure to finally meet the lovely Mr James Hennesy at the Reptile Village, and we talked about some field survey work in Guatamala next year... watch this space!!

As for now, this afternoon I will leave Llandudno where I've been for a couple of nights with family, and head for the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine to meet my friend Paul Rowley, who is a venom extractor- I've been wanting to snoop around his snake collection for a while now so am very excited!

Swimming with alligators!

As I type I am sat in the cafe on Holyhead ferry port. Not the most plush of venues, but the hot chocolate is doing the job after my 5am start and 4 hour 40 drive to get here. The reason for my journey is my latest mini adventure and a cause that is very close to my heart- this evening I will swim with alligators in a bid to raise as much funding as possible to support the in and ex situ conservation work of Crocodiles of the World, who are the UK's only crocodile zoo and have recently been granted charitable status to aid in their work. One of their most exciting in-house triumphs recently is breeding and hatching American alligators, only the second time this has been achieved in the UK, and the father of the babies is Albert, a big gator to whom I was primary care taker for at Amazing Animals for many years. I miss him terribly, but when he transferred up the road to be set up with his now mate Daisy, and I saw how happy he is, I couldn't be more pleased for him. Here is one of his babies:

The conservation projects around the world that COTW support include the Crocodile Specialist Group, Tomistoma Task Force, Gharial Conservation Alliance and the Chinese Alligator Fund.

I will be doing my swim at Ireland's only reptile park, Reptile Village, who also support a variety of excellent conservation projects globally. if you are in Ireland, check out their webpage for listings of all their awesome Halloween activities and encounter programmes, they have tons going and and doing some really worthwhile work!

To sponsor me and help in the conservation of corcodiles, alligators and caiman, it's easy! All toy have to do is text CROC13 followed by wither £3, £5 or £10 to 70070 and it will come out of your next phone bill. 100% of your donation will go to the charity. Thank you so much for your support!!!

Where is the time going?

Yesterday I turned 30. Some of my peers are terrified or hung up about this day coming around for them.. I'm not so bothered. Had a fabulous day with my sister and family. Indoor skydiving for starters, followed by a cheeky whiz round IKEA, unplanned shopping spree in Cambridge (a bit more Xmas shopping in the bag, result!! Almost done now- pretty much the only thing I am ever organised about), then I had a belly dance lesson in the evening, which I particularly enjoyed- must get practising for an event my alter ego, one Good Gracious is performing at in November... how to find the time!

Since I last blogged have been busy doing cover work and film jobs for Amazing Animals around trying to settle into my new digs, get Eddie Rook settled in, and plan my next move...

Have had an awesome day today working for Inspired Life on their role models programme. I'm really enjoying taking the time to work with kids in schools to help them to see their lives and futures from a different perspective, and share the natural world with them, it sounds cliché but it's really so gratifying to see those "light bulb moments" and most of all help people overcome their apprehensions of reptiles and bugs and such. And of course hanging out with the other guys involved with I.S. since I got involved earlier this year is great, a really interesting mix of people doing awesome and inspiring things, the kinds of people I'd always hoped to meet at college or uni but never did... and then I get chatting to the company's founder on a random flight back from Morocco... funny how life works.