LISTEN: Highland Polar Bear In New Enclosure

The UK's only female polar bear is settling in after entering her new enclosure for the first time.

Victoria explored her new home by going for a swim in the pond at Highland Wildlife Park, where she is being introduced as a potential mate for Arktos, who lives there with fellow male Walker.

Her presence at the Kingussie park has sparked hopes it may see the birth of a polar bear cub in the future.

But keepers said Victoria and Arktos will not be brought together until next year, giving her time to get to know her own custom-built enclosure.

MFR Reporter Derek Ferguson speaks with head keeper Douglas Richardson about Victoria's arrival...

Douglas Richardson, a head keeper at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland, said: She's been very, very responsive with all the keepers, she's an absolute dream to work with.

She's been no problem at all and settled in far faster than I thought she might.

Today is the first time she's gone out into her main enclosure. She came out and completely explored the perimeter, went for a swim in the pond and had a bit of a play with the plastic blue barrel we put in there for her with an ice block in it.

Once she's completely comfortable in the enclosure she'll become more playful and more interactive with her environment.''

Victoria's enclosure is completely separate from that of the males, mimicking the behaviour of polar bears in the wild who only come together to mate.

Mr Richardson added: We were thinking we might bring Arktos over for breeding this year but we are actually a bit late in the season and I would prefer her to get plenty of time to settle into her new home without the stress of a strange boyfriend being brought over.

So, we're going to put them together next spring. Then, hopefully they will quite quickly get mating.''

The female bear arrived from Aalborg Zoo in Denmark on March 25. She was born in December 1996 at Rostock Zoo in Germany.