A tiger at Paignton Zoo in Devon has had a root canal – performed by one very brave veterinary dentist… The patient is Paignton Zoo’s 11-year-old male Sumatran tiger Fabi, who is over 2 metres long and weighs over 100 kilograms. A Sumatran tiger has 30 teeth, including four very long canines. Canine teeth are important for biting, tearing and eating meat, for jaw architecture and display. As...
What do zoo gardeners get each other for Christmas? A plant, of course – but not just any old plant. Gardeners at Paignton Zoo in Devon have given their colleagues at Marwell Zoo in Hampshire a Titan arum – one of the largest and smelliest plants in the world.
Titan arum (Amorphophallus titanum) blooms can be up to 3 metres high and 3 metres in circumference and smell like rotting meat...
Pete is the Environmental Officer for the Whitley Wildlife Conservation Trust, the charity that runs Paignton Zoo Environmental Park, Living Coasts in Torquay and Newquay Zoo in Cornwall. He’s busy overseeing a green revolution to save energy and save money. The charity is installing environmentally-friendly lighting in key buildings, with halogen and compact fluorescent lamps being replaced...
Fish at Living Coasts in Torquay have been observed performing a mating behaviour that zookeepers think has never before been recorded. Animal experts filmed female four-eyed fish (Anableps anableps) rocking from side-to-side; this appeared to attract the male to come and mate. Sharp-eyed aquarists Tom Fielding and Sam Worthington noted and eventually videoed the curious behaviour. Clare Rugg...
Paignton Zoo Environmental Park has become the only institution in the UK to keep a rare and special type of South American toad.
The Devon zoo is now home to around 30 harlequin toads, Atelopus spumarius, after adding more individuals from Manchester Museum to its existing group.
Atelopus is a genus – a group of species – of small, attractive true toads from Central and South...
This is the extraordinary moment the hatching of a rare Mauritius pink pigeon chick was caught on video – and the moment the hard work started in earnest for Paignton Zoo bird keeper Tom Tooley. Senior Bird Keeper Tom is currently 6,000 miles away on the island of Mauritius. But if you think he’s dodged the English winter to relax on a tropical island, think again. He’s spending time with...
Staff and volunteers at Paignton Zoo Environmental Park have been left shocked by the sudden death of male giraffe Yoda. The 14-year-old northern giraffe was found collapsed in the giraffe house early this morning.
Zoo spokesperson Phil Knowling said: “This has come as a huge shock. He was a noble animal, one of the best-known and best-loved characters in the Zoo. There was no warning...
Torquay’s Living Coasts is part of a new global movement to raise awareness about plastic pollution. The coalition goes under the banner of "World aquariums #ReadyToChange to #BeatPlasticPollution". The aim is to set a good example over the use of plastics and to encourage changes in behaviour. Living Coasts was the first aquarium in the UK to sign up and is one of seven in this...
Family attraction, Dartmoor Zoo, has welcomed new curator, Tom Lowry, to lead the future development of the charity's conservation activity and animal collection with the creation of a strategy to guide Dartmoor Zoo's animal antics, known as a collection plan.
As Tom puts the new collection plan into action in the coming months and years, visitors can expect to see changes...
Too many homes are being planned for Devon over the next decade, most of them are to be built on greenfield sites, and a staggering two-thirds will be bought by people who have moved into the county. These are the key findings of an independent study, commissioned by the Devon branch of the Campaign to Protect Rural England, which exposes the stark truth behind ‘official’ assessments of Devon’...
