Hornbills and roulrouls

Time to get started on the wrinkled hornbills - Aceros corrugatus.  These birds are sexually dimorphic, so I would need to paint both birds and show them in positions that displayed those distinguishing features. I would need to show the tail of at least one bird, so that the dark bar at the tail base could be seen - they both have this; the head in profile for both, showing the differences in casque shape and colour and the very different head plumage; a clear view of the necks of both and for the male this would need to extend down to the chest to show where the colouration changed.  On top of all that they needed to fit into a square composition and the positioning of the birds as such to allow them to be as big as possible within that square format.

I did a few compositional roughs to try out different positions to see how well they would or wouldn't work and once I had a composition that I felt met all those points, I started on the drawing.

I ended up putting the female in the front with the male behind as this best suited the need for the male to be more upright to show off that neck and chest. 

The last time I photographed these birds for reference was about a year ago and both were well under a year old... so the adult plumage had not yet moulted through. After a quick check on them in their aviary I could see that the females adult colouration was through - her head was now black with a blue throat patch - this has changed from the pale yellow of her juv plumage. The male had also coloured up and his casque ridge has developed more. Although I could see them in their indoor area, and I could see the changes, I could not see details. Following the ok I got last week with the animal department I arranged to go in the aviary with these birds to see them as adults much more clearly and get up to date photo's for reference.

This photo shows the male's casque development over the last year. The top image is from a year ago and the bottom image was taken this week. The recent photo isn't great in that it doesn't show the deeper colouration he now has, his colours were previous more browny red on his bill, now they are really deep red and the ridge, especially is a glorious deep red. Another change is on the mandibles of both birds... they now have serrated edges.

My visit to the aviary was interesting. The hornbills share their aviary with a small group of ground birds called roulroul partridges. I was let into the aviary and left to get the photo's of the hornbills who, very cooperatively, had come outside where I was waiting. As I stood taking a few photo's of the hornbills I could hear the roulrouls chattering away noisily somewhere near. I looked down around me to see where they were, or in fact where the one who was making the noise was. I could hear it but couldn't see it anywhere. I looked at the bases of the small bushes around me and over the ground of the surrounding area. Nothing! But it sounded so close.. very close. Then I felt something on my leg coupled with a very noisy squawking. Looking at my feet I feared I had somehow trodden on a bird or something... only to see this female having a real go at my boots and trouser legs!! 

Why was she doing this? Was it my bright yellow hi-viz coat (not the best choice for the animals but it's my only waterproof, windproof cosy coat); was it the pale colour of my trousers (keepers wear green); was it me... a stranger? I soon worked out, by my movements around the aviary to get better views/angles on the hornbills, that it was only when I was in a certain small area of the aviary that she attacked me. She was obviously upset that I was invading that/her space. So I moved away from that area, leaving her in peace and happier. 

Once I had got my range of reference photos for the hornbills I left the aviary and that lovely little roulroul. 

So back in the studio to get on with the hornbill illustration.

I transferred the drawing to the blue paper and started blocking in the basic colour.

Then I painted the branches on which they will be sat.

On Tuesday I also went up to Bug World to get more photo's of the inverts that I am due to illustrate. Today it was a spider, mantis shrimp, and trying to get some better ones of the sun beetles.

Mark showed me and Anna his prize goliath beetle larvae. This beastie weighed in at 52grms putting on 2grms from the day before! One breeder he knows of got one of these up to 90grms! What a spectacular beast.... can't wait to see it as an adult.

This is the spider I had to photo.. Brachypelma emilia. It has many common names including painted tarantula and Mexican red legged tarantula but of course it's not a proper tarantula.. those spiders are actually very different. This is a beautifully marked animal and I can't wait to paint him/her. But I have a number of fish and other animals to paint before I get to this one on the list.

Some painting work needs to be done in the underwater area of Bug World, where the giant squid mural is. The colour I thought I had used for the wall colour on which the squid is painted turned out not to be the right one.. so a check up in Bug World with Eddie and with Annemarie from the Maintenance Dept and a new colour has been ordered. Hopefully I won't have to get involved in the painting, although there are tentacles going across the areas due to be painted. So I may have to go in after, to touch up around the fiddly bits.

This was the last of my run of three 2-day weeks, so next week it's back to the normal 3 day week. 

Land snail completed

Just finished my third 'week' back at the zoo and am pleased to have completed my first illustration of 2014. This wee beastie (although for a snail it's no wee beastie!!) is a giant Ghana land snail - Achatina achatina.

The shells of these snails often grow to a length of 18 centimetres (7.1 in) with a diameter of 9 centimetres (3.5 in) and they are sometimes called giant tiger land snail because of their banded markings on the shell.

I had started this illustration back at the end of August last year before I finished for my annual leave break. So I was off to a easy start this year as the back ground was as good as done and the drawing for the beastie was ready to transfer across onto the painting. 

Also these last two weeks I have been able to finish catching up on finishing the replacement IDs and have got a few texts put onto the ID documents ready for some new species. The cassowary is back at the zoo but not yet on show as the paddock is just being finished off. So a new ID holder needed to be put up and luckily I had one, on a metal bar of the right height, stashed away in our storeroom. So it was an easy job of just positioning it and screwing it into place. Anna was on hand to make sure it was upright and level as I climbed over the rope barrier and down to the lower plant bed to place the screws at the base of the metal bar and wooden post I was attaching it to.

I took several photo's up in Bug World of species that need ID illustrations in the future... a cute little ornate sun beetle, a gorgeous Malaysian giant shield mantis and a fabulous pink leg millipede that quite stole my heart. I was also able to get quite a good shot of the huntsman spider. Mark, Curator of Invertebrates, got her positioned almost out of her tank by removing the back and holding the piece of wood she was sitting on so I could get a clear shot of her. She is what I would call the generic scary spider shape and size, and I was very aware of hairs standing on the back of my neck and a voice screaming "SPIDER! DIRTY GREAT BIG SPIDER!" in my head as I moved in with the camera... no zoom just standard small lens. Yet at the same time I am totally fascinated by their beauty and I had great trust in Mark that he would keep her in the tank and she would not be coming my way.

My next illustration on my very long, ever extending, illustration list... is a wrinkled hornbill - Aceros corrugatus. These already have an ID sign with a photo on it until I can do the illustration; and the ref photos I took of the two birds, male and female, were getting on for a year ago - they were young birds, not yet in full adult plumage. So I went to their aviary to check out how much they had changed and whether I would need to take more photos. They now have their adult plumage and the male's casque profile has changed as he has matured and so I will need to take that into when using my ref photos. I have emailed the Curator of Birds to ask if it is possible to get access to see them better next week sometime. 

It was pretty quiet around the zoo this week, although mild, the weather has been a bit damp with the odd cold sunny day. I didn't get out and about much except to quickly pop out now and again, either to put up signs or go to Bug World. But here's a couple of photo's from the last two weeks, taken en route to Bug World.

Ring-tailed lemurs huddled on a cold grey day.

One of the spider monkey boys coming over to get a closer look at the strange flourescent yellow coated lady.

"Herbert" the female huntsman spider. Has legspan of several inches more than I find comfortable.

Back to work

I work at the zoo for nine months in each year and the three months I am not there I am working at home on my own projects. September and October were two of my three month leave (January was my other month off) and then I was also on unpaid leave for November and December for family reasons. So it's been four months since I was last at the zoo in a work capacity and this was my first week back. My brain has been thrust into seemingly remembering a hundred things. Mush is what I might have described my thought processes on Monday and Tuesday!

I started the week by doing my usual 'after leave walkabout' to reacquaint myself with the collection to see what's new, what's changed, what signs need replacing etc. From this I end up with a list of ID signs that need replacing, removing or re-fixing if loose. Most of Tuesday and Wednesday were spent printing and laminating the replacements and putting them up in place when done. At the same time I give the signs a clean to wipe away the accumulation of winter muck that has dirtied them so far.

We have the cassowary's returning to the zoo soon (they have been up at Wild Place for a while) and they are having a new paddock done for them so I gave the new area a quick look over to see where best to place the ID signs. Whilst out doing this I also took a few photo's of some hybrid ducks we have on our water areas (the lake and gorilla moat).  Our waterfowl collection in these areas have been allowed to naturally deplete and we now only have a small group of Chiloe wigeon left, along with the many wild mallard and moorhens that habitually use the zoo. That is, apart from four other very handsome ducks. These individuals are hybrids- the results of wild mallard breeding with ruddy shelduck and pintail when we had them in our collection. As the variety of species have lessened these individuals stand out more, so there is the thought to have a sign explaining what they are and why they are here. I took the pictures in preparation, in case this idea goes ahead.

There was a quick meeting with Jonny from the Aquarium late on Wednesday afternoon to check the species in each tank so that we could work out how many new lightboxes would be needed when the old ones are replaced. The aquarium is currently closed at the mo whilst the walk through centre tank is stripped out and redone. A new tunnel is being installed and for that the whole tank construction needs to be demolished and started again. It's amazing when you stand in that now empty space to see just how big that tank is/was, something that was impossible to appreciate when looking in the old tank.

So my first (three day) 'week' back ends.... I think by the end of Wednesday I was starting to regain my zoo work mode and have my plan of action underway. It all started to make more sense.

Sorting out the lake bird signs - I had to remove one ID holder and post as I reduced the ID signs on display.

The two lion juveniles are really starting to look like proper lions now, although they still have a lot of growing and filling out to do.

The golden lion tamarins were intrigued with my blue cleaning cloth as I cleaned their ID sign, so I held it near the glass for them to come over and investigate.

A red-billed leiothrix (Pekin robin) 

Roulroul partridges mistook me for a keeper I think, and thought I was about to feed them, so they all gathered round my feet as I checked the signs in their 'house'.

Life imitating art. 

Couldn't get the whole area of the centre tank space in on my camera, it's so big!