Borth Animalarium Private Zoo For Sale

Agreed, I doubt it will ever happen. Fingers crossed for a lottery win or a really generous bank loan though ;p.
The main species at Borth that intrique me are the Ocelot and African Leopard (very few zoos in the UK seem to have any leopard other than Amur, and though that is the one that most needs conservation I do like the prospect of the African subspecies). Also, a leopard would give you an instant pull for casual zoo goers (I always see medium-big cats, apes, bears, elephants, hippos and rhinos as the crowd pullers, have one or two of these and it'll really help)

I will still aim towards it though, no harm in dreaming :)
 
Javan Rhino said:
The main species at Borth that intrique me are the ...African Leopard (very few zoos in the UK seem to have any leopard other than Amur
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Well the article says it is a former pet, so I would not place much stock in it being a pureblooded african leopard. Most likely a generic hybrid (although it is possible that it was imported from Africa).
 
Arizona Docent said:
Well the article says it is a former pet, so I would not place much stock in it being a pureblooded african leopard. Most likely a generic hybrid (although it is possible that it was imported from Africa).
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That's a good point. If you ran a privately owned zoo, would the larger charity-run zoos allow you to house their surplus animals? Or do they not 'trade' with privatly run zoos?

I hope you get my meaning, don't know really how better to word it.
 
Javan Rhino said:
That's a good point. If you ran a privately owned zoo, would the larger charity-run zoos allow you to house their surplus animals? Or do they not 'trade' with privatly run zoos?

I hope you get my meaning, don't know really how better to word it.
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There are plenty of for-profit zoos in the various regional collection management programs. In the UK alone I can think of Colchester, Longleat, Woburn, West Midlands, Blair Drummond, Knowsley, Dartmoor, Blackpool, Banham, Africa Alive!, Welsh Mountain, Cotswold, South Lakes, Blackbrook, Chessington, Drusillas and Yorkshire off the top of my head. I'm sure there are many others, but that's enough to make the point.

Of course, private operations have to earn their stripes before they can hope to get EEP animals.
 
Arizona Docent said:
Well the article says it is a former pet, so I would not place much stock in it being a pureblooded african leopard. Most likely a generic hybrid (although it is possible that it was imported from Africa).
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If this is the individual I think it is, it it was originally bred at Basildon Zoo before being sold to a private keeper. So it is more than likely to be a subspecific hybrid. The Ocelot would have come fom the same private keeper.
 
Best thing to do here is to buy the land and collection try and rehouse the collection on another site colser to a much heavier populated area and much larger site say 60 acres and then sell the land off so as to bring in some revenue while you are getting set up in the new site.
 
A good idea, but you would need alot of money to be able to buy the collection and 60+acres of land. Even if you sold th 12 acres that Borth stands on you would have to throw in alot of your own money, and then on top of that development.
In the long term it would be best, as Borth doesn't seem the best investment, but you'd have to be prepared to use alot in the first place.
 
Javan Rhino said:
No worries :), so is there no surrounding land that could be purchased (I remember reading that it was 12 acres included, 2 of which the zoo was. Is there any land around that?)
Also, what I suggested was long-term and if you were loaded (lottery-win).

I do want to run a zoo when I'm older, personally I would build one on the outskirts of a large city (Manchester/Liverpool), but way out enough for there to be loads of development room.
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I think 10 acres owned? There's plenty of farmland around that could be bought up too. I'm of the same viewpoint as you, it could be amazing, but it needs loads of investment. Give me 5 million and I could make it ace, but then it wouldn't be profitable for 10 years or so.
As it is, I guess you could make it worthwhile if you just improved it a bit, but some of those animals would need to be sent elsewhere because they just can't be cared for there.
 
Excellent point, though if you had the money to do it up you could probably afford to extend/rebuild exhibits and make sure you can care for them. It could be nice if you could expand with surrounding farmland, but it would take somebody with alot of money and alot of passion. Unfortunately, I only have the passion :(.
 
Same. If I had a lottery win I don't know if I would buy Borth, or whether I would try and start fro scratch. I think I would start development of a main park nearer to a city, whilst buying Borth to house any surplus animals and bring in a small secondary income.
 
Personally I think you are all living in a dream world where in my opinion, you could do alot more for conservation in other jobs, rather than owning a zoo which may or may not act on Conservation. An in situ career, in my opinion, would do alot more for conservation than ex situ.

Although I do believe we need ex situ! Dont get me wrong we need Zoos!
 
Paix said:
Personally I think you are all living in a dream world where in my opinion, you could do alot more for conservation in other jobs, rather than owning a zoo which may or may not act on Conservation. An in situ career, in my opinion, would do alot more for conservation than ex situ.

Although I do believe we need ex situ! Dont get me wrong we need Zoos!
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Of course its a dream, its a dream for many people. Nothing wrong with that :D, after all it was a dream for George Mottershead and for Gerald Durrel.

How many times do you go around a zoo thinking 'it would be good if,' or 'wouldn't it be cool if there was an exhibit where' etc. I think we are all allowed to dream :)
 
I think someone shouldnt buy this if they just have £850,000 they probably need 3.5-4 million to buy it then probably knock down most of the old enclosures and start again on the same land (using the additional 10 acres). They could bring in a few more animals and improve the quality and size of some enclosures for the ones they have at the moment.

I would hate for someone to buy it and just keep it as it is.
 
Paix said:
Personally I think you are all living in a dream world where in my opinion, you could do alot more for conservation in other jobs, rather than owning a zoo which may or may not act on Conservation. An in situ career, in my opinion, would do alot more for conservation than ex situ.

Although I do believe we need ex situ! Dont get me wrong we need Zoos!
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So your point is nobody should own zoos, but zoos should still exist?? Please enlighten us as to how that's supposed to work?
 
Dartboy said:
I think someone shouldnt buy this if they just have £850,000 they probably need 3.5-4 million to buy it then probably knock down most of the old enclosures and start again on the same land (using the additional 10 acres). They could bring in a few more animals and improve the quality and size of some enclosures for the ones they have at the moment.

I would hate for someone to buy it and just keep it as it is.
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Instead of buying a dilapidated zoo in a terrible location, would it not be a better idea for someone to start from scratch (thus buying the land far cheaper and not having the demolition fees) in an area which is actually going to receive enough visitors to make it self-sufficient?
 
Redpanda that was the point I was trying to make, but with a bit added on you could always use the land for a campsite or caravan park and have some income coming in while you tried to establish your zoo, or you could gain planning permission to turn the land over to say homes or holiday lets this way you would have a return on your initional outlay and you would have the start of a collection.
 
Devi said:
So your point is nobody should own zoos, but zoos should still exist?? Please enlighten us as to how that's supposed to work?
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I did not say nobody should own zoos, what I believe is that Zoochatters (and this is regarding their personal money sums) should not attempt to start a zoo or buy a zoo unless they have a good few million, 5 at the least.

This country needs to have more world class zoos and starting more shed and aviary zoos is not going to help. Im sorry but this is my view. If I won the lottery, say 10 million, I would start a zoo, and if others on here did, I would encourage them too!
 
Javan Rhino said:
Of course its a dream, its a dream for many people. Nothing wrong with that :D, after all it was a dream for George Mottershead and for Gerald Durrel.

How many times do you go around a zoo thinking 'it would be good if,' or 'wouldn't it be cool if there was an exhibit where' etc. I think we are all allowed to dream :)
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Ahh but in those days there wasnt the same competition as now, there was a few zoos, not hundreds. It is a dream but its a dream that needs millions put into it, not thousands, well, in this day and age.
 
adrian1963 said:
Redpanda that was the point I was trying to make, but with a bit added on you could always use the land for a campsite or caravan park and have some income coming in while you tried to establish your zoo, or you could gain planning permission to turn the land over to say homes or holiday lets this way you would have a return on your initional outlay and you would have the start of a collection.
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Im pritty sure their feilds are used for camping at the moment.
 
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