Polar Bear enclosure - 1982

Great historic photo, but what a brutal cage.

how terrible, especially the tiny pond

Just how horrible is it all; the concrete walls and floor, lack of stimulation, grubby rotten meat and a tiny black pool.

I've only been to Chessington once - back in 1982 - and I wasn't impressed with it at the time at all.

I understand things have got better since then.

The polar bears were only kept in here very briefly whilst their former enclosure was altered , they did also spend time at London Zoo for the same reasons. There were three of these moated enclosures . At one time Chessington kept Syrian Brown , American Black , Asiatic Black , Sloth , Malayan Sun Bears and Polar Bears , aswell as Brown Bears. They never bred Sun Bears at Chessington. Z.

In the same year , 1982 , two young Polar Bear cubs arrived "Bonnie and Clyde", they were kept in the other" proper" Polar Bear exhibit. They lived here until 1991 when they went to Zagreb Zoo , Yugoslavia (now croatia). They were the last bears kept at chessington zoo. The three "open" enclosures with a dry ditch were converted to house a mixed exhibit of Barbary Sheep and Barbary Macaques in 1985 , the bears having moved out around 1983/84. This only worked for a brief time - the runaway mine train now occupies the former site roughly. Z

So the bear in this photo remained at the zoo until 1985? Or did it die or leave sooner. Were chessington at one point keeping polar bears in both the pit above and the newly refurbished pit between 1982 and 1985?

You say they never bred sun bears at Chessington. What bear species did breed successfully?

This Polar Bear pictured was not there when the two cubs "Bonnie & Clyde" arrived and so there were not two enclosures housing Polars at the same time. The animal pictured was fairly old at that time but I cannot recall what happened to him , however he was certainly not in the old enclosures for long as they were empty and boarded up in 1983-84 and then re-developed a little to house the Barbary Sheep and Barbary Macaques before ultimately being demolished. The Malayan Sun Bears were the only bear species not to breed at Chessington , brown , sloth , polar , Syrian Brown , American Black and Asiatic Blacks all bred as far as I can remember.

By the way I worked with "Bonnie & Clyde" at Chessington Zoo - the highlight of my zoo career!

Interesting comments, to me its no worse than the Tiger and Bear pits at Dudley.... NOW!!