Small UK collection Questions?

adrian1963

adrian1963

Well-Known Member
After a couple of days to think about this I thought I would throw it open to all you zoo lovers on here.

1- After going through the Zoochat Gallery I was wondering what small captive collections (public) are out there that haven't been covered by you great photographers and why?

2- Are there any small collections (public) that aren't mentioned in any threads on Zoochat (UK only).

3- Have any of you visited a small collection (public) that hasn't been mentioned on Zoochat before and if so what did you think of it?
 
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I have visited a couple of places in the UK that haven't been covered by Zoochat members.

Both are local to me and I visit regularly, both are very small, they also hold zoo licenses.

1. Van Hages in Ware, Hertfordshire
Hold a small collection of probably around 75-100 animals. Lots of domestic stock but also common marmosets, raccoons, coatis, barn owls, red legged partridge, meerkats, skunks, sulcata tortoises and various pheasants. It is free to get into due to being in the middle of a garden centre.

2. Willows Farm Falconry, St. Albans, Hertfordshire
This closed last winter but it had been there for at least 30 years! It is inside Willows Farm which is a large children's farm/theme park and so was free to look around and they presented 2-3 bird of prey displays daily.

I'm sure there are also plenty of other places like this around the UK!
 
Many thanks for the link have now sent an e-mail to the collection hoping to receive a reply soon
 
I recently visited Amazonia near Glasgow. It has photos on here but no threads that I've found and is definitely small! It is an indoor tropical house, part of a wider 'theme park' complex, and contains reptiles, amphibians, inverts, a couple of bird species (macaws & toucan) and a few mammals (small monkeys, kinkajous, seba's fruit bats). Overall, I didn't really like it, the enclosures were just too small and tired for me, but it does have potential. Tropical theming is well done with live tropical plants and free-flying butterflies and staff were very friendly. It hasn't changed a whole lot from the older photos on here.
 
I like All Things Wild Nature Centre nr Evesham in Worcestershire. Went there yesterday and did a tour with the manager. It's still being developed, and the future plans sound very exciting!

Excellent place for kids and education, with a fantastic dinosaur area as an added bonus!:D
 
TeaLovingDave said:
There is a thread discussing the big cat collection there at the following link:

http://www.zoochat.com/38/big-cats-really-do-exist-rutland-209382/
Click to expand...

I was at Rutland yesterday for a photography day and can confirm that they have a cracking collection of birds, unfortunately I can't be specific on what they had as I can't remember everything but off the top of my head they had
1 US Barn Owl,
5 other Barn Owls 2 of which were different colours,
Great Grey Owl
Lots of Harris Hawks
3 Red Tailed Hawk
2 European Eagle Owls
A Crow
Turkey Vulture
Lots of small owls and a lot more larger owls.

Now to my favourite part of the day the cats :-)

4 Amur Leopards Manx, Dendee, Uri & Artum
1 African Hybrid Leopard Kali
2 North Persian Leopards Cyrus & Sade
1 Serval.

I had an enjoyable day and managed to get some nice pics of the birds and the cats. I would recommend a visit there to anyone.
 
The Monkey Sanctuary down in Looe doesn't seem to have any threads or pictures. They have woolly monkeys, capuchins tufted and weeper (I belive they are the only weepers in a public collection in the UK) and 3 Barbary macaques all rescued from the pet trade or circuses
 
monkeyarmy said:
The Monkey Sanctuary down in Looe doesn't seem to have any threads or pictures. They have woolly monkeys, capuchins tufted and weeper (I belive they are the only weepers in a public collection in the UK) and 3 Barbary macaques all rescued from the pet trade or circuses
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Are you saying all the animals were "rescued" or just the macaques (as I thought most of the woolly's were born there or transferred in)?
 
The original follies were rescued from the pet trade by the founder. The capuchins have all come from the pet trade and the macaques were rescued from a French travelling zoo
 
The Barn Owl Center in Gloucester might interest you. Along with Barn Owls are other, mainly British, birds of prey. They have photography days.
 
As a follow up to my original comment on Van Hages Ware, the site had been redesigned with lots of buildling work going on, new species such as a pair of raccoon dogs and they are also hoping to build a small reptile house onsite.

Last month 4 baby coatis were born and now all growing up and getting into much mischief.
 
adrian1963 said:
Neither of the above seem to be listed on Zootierliste anyone have a full species list for either?
Click to expand...

I'm afraid not, you could email them. Another collection I just tho of is Prinknash, also in Gloucester.
 
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