This week we celebrated the 8th birthday of our resident slow coach Sid, so I thought we would delve into the realms of everyone’s favourite lazy tree dweller, the sloth.There are 6 different species of sloth found across Central and South America: Pygmy three-toed sloth (Bradypus pygmaeus) Maned sloth (Bradypus torquatus) Pale-throated sloth (Bradypus tridactylus)…
I wrote a blog over four years ago about becoming a zoo keeper so I think it’s time for an update. Working with animals is something that a lot of people strive to achieve and being a zoo keeper is something that a lot of people dream of being. With this blog I’m going to…
If you were keeping up with our live stream videos, you may have heard that we had some exciting news whilst the park was closed during lockdown. Our White Stork pair, Rodney and Cassandra, became first time parents! In previous years, the pair had nested without success, but in my blog this week I’d love…
I think we can all agree it has been far too long since I last spoke to you all about the Lowland Tapirs at the park. For anyone that might be new to the park or may not know much about our pair, I will give you a little refresher about them. Nando our male…
Penguin Moult – the scruffy phase. Moulting King Penguins at Volunteer Point, the Falklands. Photo credit: John Buckingham Back to team bird for the keeper blog this week, and this time I’ll be covering penguin moult… because you just can’t have too many blogs about Penguins right? When you first see a moulting penguin, it…
Retractable and non-retractable We all know what claws are. Many animals such as birds and mammals have them. They are a useful appendage on the ends of their toes or fingers and have many uses. If you have cats or dogs at home you may know there are differences. Cats have retractable claws which means…
Times have been hard recently with the coronavirus situation. Even a simple shop has become a challenge as the day to day items have become luxuries. Even here at the park changes have had to be made. However, it is nice that our thoughts can take us far away from these struggles and I believe…
I would love to introduce you to some of our biggest characters on team Bird, and they live in our parrot flight aviary. Parrots are sometimes a challenge to work with because they are a raucous group of birds with strong attitudes, a strong bite and a loud, no extremely loud voice! I wouldn’t change…
In some countries walking through the wilderness can be dangerous. There are some impressive carnivores all around the world which could make it a hazardous pastime. Lions in Africa, polar bears in the arctic, crocodiles in Australia. Here in the UK we have it easy but we too had our own top predators in the…
As we celebrate the start of a New Year and a new decade, I have decided to take a look back at what has been happening in the world of conservation over the last ten years. The IUCN red list has been releasing a lot of statements over the past few months concerning the worrying…