One observation from those photos is that the new bear exhibit is not at all naturalistic. Before I get shot down - I fully appreciate the need for mental stimulation for captive carnivores and that bears are particularly prone to stereotypical behaviour. I certainly don't have a problem with the the enrichment provided for the bears - they look adequately suitable. However... WW's main appeal is that it is a small zoo situated amongst established woodland. You come across exhibits while walking along woodland paths. In fact if the exhibits were not in woodland (say farm paddocks) WW would look downright terrible as most of the fencing is basic wooden posts and mesh. It is the mature trees which make the world of difference. But that bear exhibit could be in any smaller zoo that wasn't fussed with making it look natural. It stands out like a sore thumb. I could be doing it a disservice as I've not seen it in life but even Whipsnade's ancient bear exhibit is better and that is because it looks like a bit of 'wild' that has a fence around it.
Those pictures show the quarantine enclosure - there is another much bigger woodland enclosure, but I think they are letting the bears settle in for a while before giving them permanent access to it. Although I cannot find a full view of the enclosure, I think this video should show what it basically looks like. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_3c5-OBdZQ
There are 3 Arctic Wolves, two sisters and a brother. They are in temporary accommodation but are visible and signage is present. Their actual enclosure is under construction near the pine martens, and includes a refrigeration unit to keep them cool during the summer months.
Arctic fox? Does anybody know the current situation with the wolves? Are they still breeding? Most of the founders and older pack members must be dead now, so I'm interested to know what is left of the display.
And it seems that this Wildwood expansion has already started - the Trust now operates a visitor centre at Escot by Ottery St Mary in Devon (since 2015) which houses red squirrels, wild boar, beavers and wildcats (along with apparently Asian small-clawed otters) and has now recently welcomed a pair of male Eurasian lynx from RZSS (I guess Highland Wildlife Park) - they were born in 2015 and are named Theron and Lorcan. Blog post about the arrival of the lynx is below: Wildwood Trust: Lynx Set to Rewild Devon Information about Escot Park and some of the animals kept there is below: living heritage - Escot - The natural place for a great day out in Devon
Some more news from the new Wildwood site in Escot - two new enclosures are currently being constructed for pine martens and wolves. The new website (still under construction) is available here: wildwoodescot
This was the wolf update from their 2016 roundup email: If you're a regular visitor to our Kent park, you may have spotted two new wolves in the enclosure located behind Mischka - our 16 year-old hand reared wolf. The male from Sweden and female from Switzerland are young and very energetic. After serving an isolation period, they are now acclimatising to their new surroundings, keepers and routines and should shortly be integrated into the large wolf enclosure with our existing wolves - Amber and Akela.
A new aviary, billed as the largest aviary in Kent, has recently opened and houses a flock of red-billed chough. The intention is to reintroduce choughs to Kent, where they became extinct over a century ago. The information comes from the Wildwood Trust's Facebook page.
I'm presuming these Choughs, like Jersey's founder stock, also came from Paradise Park in Conwall. There is no mention of their origin but when I clicked the link to 'Choughs' on the Wildwood FB page, it led to a Paradise Park facebook page.
Wildwood have now welcomed their first red-billed chough chick. They are the first chough chick to have been born in the county of Kent since they went extinct in the wild there 150 years ago. First ‘Chough’ Chick Born in Kent for 150 years! | Wildwood Trust
If the project to release Choughs in Kent comes to fruition, I guess Paradise Park will be available to supply more birds for them in the way they have for Jersey's reintroduction, as Jersey will not be needing any more soon from them, because (some of) the released population and their own captive birds are now breeding.
Paradise Park in Cornwall have for a long time now been the main breeder/producer of captive Choughs in the UK. I do not know where their founder stock came from though, possibly from private breeders. When it first opened they had a single pair, but presumably acquired more founder stock later on. They have 3-4 regular breeding pairs and most years they seem to produce 8-10 chicks. I believe Jersey's three breeding pairs all came from there, and certainly all those in the release project are either from these pairs or(most of them) young birds bred at Paradise Park and sent over to Jersey (Lee Durrell flies over to Cornwall in her small plane to collect them personally, for ease of transfer) So I suspect virtually all captive UK choughs originate from Paradise Park, making it a very limited genetic pool. Paignton Zoo kept their own( probably unrelated to Paradise Park's) birds for many years but the stock dwindled and their last one was sent to PP quite recently. There may be other breeders (Chester for example keep them also) but I don't know of them.
Two Eurasian beavers from Wildwood are due to be released into the wild in the Knapdale Forest in Scotland this week. They are two of up to 28 beavers to be released over the next three years, with the aim of increasing the genetic diversity of the group already living there. Information comes from the Wildwood Trust's Facebook page.
One piece of news I haven't seen mentioned - four sand lizards (three males and one female) arrived from Chester Zoo in December 2017. The lizards are being kept with a view to breeding them and reintroducing them to Kent, where they became extinct during the 1970s. Further information is included below: UK’s rarest lizards return to Kent | Wildwood Trust
Looking at the Scottish Wildlife Trust and RZSS websites, it seems three beavers were released in October 2017 - the two from Wildwood plus a third animal (possibly from Highland Wildlife Park). It says that the next reintroductions are expected to take place in the spring of 2018 (exact times were not given).
Four European grey wolf cubs have been born and recently have started coming above ground in the new enclosure. Further information is included in the link below: New Wolf Cubs at Wildwood | Wildwood Trust
