Not even the rain that fell from leaden Cheshire skies could dampen the enthusiasm of my four-year-old daughter Clem over her first visit to the zoo. And not just any zoo, but the site of the new Islands, the largest zoo development ever seen in the UK.
“It’s just like monsoon season!” I said. There is plenty of rainfall in the south-east Asian islands and that’s what we – Clem, two-year-old Gilda and I – had come to Chester zoo to find out about.
The zoo’s eagerly anticipated 15-acre Islands exhibit recreates the environments of the six south-east Asian islands of Papua, Panay, Bali, Sumba, Sulawesi and Sumatra. It also includes the largest indoor zoo exhibit in the UK, Monsoon Forest, and the Bali Starling Temple, housing one of the rarest birds in the world, found only on Nusa Penida.
The emphasis here is very much on conservation, and on each real-life island the zoo is in partnership with organisations on the ground to encourage awareness.
At Chester zoo itself, 75 volunteers have been recruited to answer questions. There are about 650 animals and 50,000 plants in the exhibit, as well as 36 species of tree.
Our journey began with the 15-minute Lazy River boat ride past species such as the rare cassowary, with legs like tree trunks; an important disperser of forest fruit and one of the world’s most dangerous birds.
We also sailed past a couple of warty pigs. These mohicanned cuties are the rarest of all wild pigs; their native habitat on the island of Panay is under threat from extensive farming.
The point of Islands is not just to showcase the animals, but also to highlight their plights. Fewer than 100 Sumatran tigers and rhino are left in the wild, and the orangutan’s treetop homes are being lost to palm oil plantations. The Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme works to raise community awareness and investigate reforested sites.
The islands have been recreated with sourced materials and items: a hut with pots and pans here; a garden with chickens there. Bali is awash with brightly coloured tuk-tuks and flowered pots and pans. There’s even a Coral Sands permit office, where you can collect a book to log sightings of animals.
A quick themed face-paint (Clem chose a lion, Gilda chose a ladybird), followed by a hearty lunch of Malaysian curry at the Indonesian street food kitchen finished off a special day, one that we’ll remember for a very long time.
My day at the zoo, by Clem (four)
We went to the zoo and I got my face painted like a lion. We saw monkeys and orangutans and a big snake and a massive bird with massive legs, but it wasn’t a scary bird. Well it would have been a scary bird if it could get us, but it couldn’t get us because we were on a boat. It rained a lot and we got very wet, but I like the rain. And I had hot chocolate!