Brownsea Island

A couple of weeks ago I made a visit to Brownsea Island. The island sits within Poole Harbour (Second largest in the world by area!), and is about  1.5 miles long and 3/4 mile wide and is of course only accessible by boat. It is basically owned by the National Trust but has a complicated history that includes The Scouting Association, John Lewis Partnership, and the Dorset Wildlife Trust! The image above shows the arrival dock and some holiday cottages. On the way in a view of one of the bird hides (below).

I took with me my Canon EOS 30 with the 40mm STM, but the main reason for that camera choice was that the most powerful lens I own currently is a 75-300 Canon Auto Focus. I needed it for the image above of Terns. I ended up using a couple of rolls of Kodak Gold. I took a walk around part of the wooded area under the care of the Dorset Wildlife Trust, and got quite close to a friendly female pheasant.

Just on from my pheasant encounter there is a lookout. Looking north back towards Poole town, the ferry that had brought me here had made a return journey and was on it’s way back with the next collection of visitors!

There is however one main reason people really come to Brownsea, and that is to see a Red Squirrel. There is a small population of them here, mainly as the invasive grey squirrel has never been introduced. It’s one of the few places in the south of the UK where you may see one! Before you say “ohh how lovely” here’s a fun fact… “The Brownsea red squirrel population is the only population known in the UK to carry the human form of the bacteria stem Mycobacterium leprae that causes leprosy in humans” – perhaps I won’t pet one today!