New Bristol Zoo aims to be conservation leader
With Bristol Zoo Gardens in Clifton set to close, we've been hearing all about its conservation work and how that will continue at Wild Place
With just three days now until Bristol Zoo Gardens leaves its historic site in Clifton (September 3), we have been given more behind the scenes access, this time to hear all about the critically endangered animals being protected in our city.
When Wild Place rebrands as the new Bristol Zoo in 2024 the aim is that 80 percent of the animals there will be involved in some form of breeding programme to protect the species, but lots of that work is already going on, as we have been finding out.
Today (September 1) our Senior Reporter James Diamond was shown around by the zoo's Director of Conservation and Science, Brian Zimmerman.
Fish
In recent years it seems some of the zoo's most pioneering conservation work has involved fish.
Brian talked us through one particular story of a species saved from presumed extinction.
"In 2012 we did a survey to find out which zoos and aquariums in Europe were keeping Madagascan fish and that survey revealed that there were only four Mangarahara Cichlids left," he said.
"There were two males at London Zoo and a male and female at Berlin Zoo and unfortunately, Cichlids being what they are, they're a bit aggressive, the male killed the female at Berlin Zoo.
"That started this global search to try and find a female to breed with the males, because they did think the species was extinct in the wild because the river that it came from was dried up during the dry season, so obviously no fish could live there."
Despite the search no more Cichlids were found anywhere else in captivity, so Brian and others went on an expedition to Madagascar to try and find any remaining in the wild.
"After a month of searching we ended up finding a small intermittent pool in a tributary of the Mangarahara River, where there was still some of these fish present," he said.
The group decided to take 19 of the fish, bred them in a controlled environment elsewhere in Madagascar and though the species is still endangered, it is now much more numerous.
"The fish that we have here in the aquarium today are the descendants of those 19 fish that we took, back in 2013," Brian told us.
Hidden away from public view, the zoo is also home to what Brian calls "the fish room", in which dozens of tanks house all kinds of fresh water species, also at risk of extinction.
"They're one of the most threatened groups of animals on the planet, under severe pressure and many species are already extinct in the wild and a lot of them are critically endangered," he said.
"So what we're trying to do here is provide that last chance saloon, for those species that are on the brink of extinction and one of the ways we're doing that is to provide enclosures where they can breed and we can manage them, ideally as colonies."
All of the species housed in the fish room are due to move over to Wild Place into its Conservation Centre, when that becomes the new Bristol Zoo.
Reptiles
Fish are by no means the only species being protected in Bristol
In the Reptile House, still on public display, you can find the Turquoise Dwarf Gecko.
"These animals actually came in from a customs confiscation," Brian said.
"That's how they ended up in zoos in the first place, because they were being smuggled in for the pet trade, but we work in Tanzania and we've worked there for a number of years with a type of monkey called the Sanje Mangabey, and just recently because we're already working in Tanzania, we thought we'd expand what we're doing there.
"Because these geckos are critically endangered and they're found in Tanzania, our head of conservation went earlier this year to the place where these animals are found to see if we can help the conservation efforts on the ground there."
Their natural habitat in Tanzania has become completely surrounded in modern times by farm land.
"They're basically on an island in the forest," Brian said.
"So one of the things we'd like to do there, as well as monitor the populations, is find out is there any way we can increase the habitat size and replant the forest."
Spiders and snails
Some of the animals being bred at Bristol Zoo have been so rarely studied by the world's scientists, that very little is known about them.
Inside Bug World you can find a species of spider and snail, both from Madeira in Portugal, which fit that category.
"The Desertas Wolf Spider only comes from a very small island off of Madeira called Desertas," Brian said.
"It's a very dry island that's been heavily impacted by introduced species, particularly goats on the island have severely grazed the grass and altered the habitat, so they are critically endangered.
"We are running the project that basically, it's called an EP or an Ex Situ Programme.
"It's a breeding programme to try and secure sufficient numbers of these animals as an insurance, if something really horribly goes wrong, or worsens in Desertas where they're from."
Bristol Zoo Gardens has won an award for its work breeding the spiders.
Also from Desertas are two species of land snail, both of which are critically endangered.
"We're working together with Chester Zoo to try and work out and learn more about how they breed and what they eat and how they survive.
"And the idea there is we'll develop a husbandry or care manual, for how to look after and how to breed them, that we'll then give to the government in Madeira so they can reproduce the snails themselves and return them back to the wild."
Wild Place and the Conservation Breeding Centre
When Bristol Zoo Gardens closes on Saturday (September 3), many of the animals will begin to be moved to its sister site Wild Place, near Cribbs Causeway.
Over the next two years that site will be expanded and eventually will rebrand as the new Bristol Zoo, at which point it will feature an entire "Conservation Campus", including a Conservation Breeding Centre.
That will be a home to all sorts of endangered animals where experts will study them and work to increase their numbers.
"This is a place where students will be able to come of course and learn more about them," Brian said.
"We really want to make sure that students that are training to become conservationists have an opportunity to work with some of these highly threatened animals, so that they learn and can conduct research to find out more about them.
Brian told us it is "extremely satisfying" to be involved in conservation.
"What we're learning here in the zoo and in the aquarium, directly goes and contributes to protecting those species in the wild," he said.
"So it's incredibly satisfying to know that the work we're doing here in Bristol, is having an impact on those animals in the wild from very far away.
"The Wild Place site is 12 times the size of Bristol Zoo Gardens, which means the conservation work we can do is going to be expanded significantly."