We run these meetings in conjunction with Counterpoint Networking, so please click here for details.

Port Lympne’s Scottish Wildcats have been given a chance to see the park from a different point of view with the construction of special raised walkways.

Better View for Visitors

The raised walkways, enclosed in a mesh tunnel, extend from the cats’ enclosures and travel around an area of the park before returning to the enclosure once more. The innovative system allows the cats to wander around a much larger territory. As well as allowing the cats to explore much more of the park, the walkways also afford visitors a better view of the often shy and elusive animals as they travel around the walkways and sit out in new vantage points. The walkways were funded by contributions from a campaign run by Your Cat Magazine, run through The Scottish Wildcat Association.

Wildcat in Walkway - photographs by Neville Buck

One of World’s Most Endangered Cats

Head Small Cat Keeper, Neville Buck, who is holder of the Studbook for this species, commented:

‘People don’t often realise we have one of the world’s most endangered cats right here in the UK. Our new walkways allow the cats greater freedom to explore, as well as being a good way to significantly increase the area available to them. They can travel a large distance at a variety of heights, through trees and in areas they wouldn’t normally be able to go. The cats absolutely love them and we are delighted they have been so successful!’

Wildcat in Walkway - photographs by Neville Buck

The largest of the wildcat family, Scottish Wildcats weigh in between 5-9kg – around 50% larger than your average domestic cat. Scottish Wildcats live primarily in woodland but since the rapid deforestation of Scotland at the beginning of the 1900’s, they have adapted to live in mixed habitats including farmland.

Steve Piper, Chairman of the Scottish Wildcat Association, commented:

“We’re overjoyed to have been able to put Your Cat together with the Aspinall’s team to create these fantastic walkways for their wildcats, as anyone who likes cats knows, they love having a high viewpoint and, poised on the very edge of the North Downs looking out on miles of Kent’s beautiful Romney Marshes and the distant English Channel, this really is quite a view. I grew up in Kent visiting the Aspinall’s parks regularly with my parents and they’ve always been at the absolute forefront of caring for endangered species, we’re very fortunate to have their expertise helping lead the Scottish Wildcat captive breeding program and we look forward to finding more opportunities like this one to help them continue to expand, improve and lead captive breeding efforts.”

Release Programme for Cats

The Aspinall Foundation’s Port Lympne Wild Animal Park hopes to be at the forefront in breeding the Scottish Wildcat. The park has now got eight cats and in the future hopes to coordinate a release program. These elegant animals are almost impossible to see in the wild, so the new walkways offer a perfect opportunity to observe them. For further information about visiting the Scottish Wildcats at Port Lympne, or to adopt a cat, please visit www.aspinallfoundation.org

We run these meetings in conjunction with Counterpoint Networking, so please click here for details.

We run these meetings in conjunction with Counterpoint Networking, so please click here for details.

We run these meetings in conjunction with Counterpoint Networking, so please click here for details.

Howletts and Port Lympne Wild Animal Parks are well known within the UK and Europe for their high standards of animal welfare and captive breeding success. 2009 was yet another successful year for new births across both parks, and there were also several new additions to the collection. The parks have the largest collection of critically endangered Western Lowland gorillas and Eastern black rhinoceros in the world. There were 4 gorilla births in 2009 (bringing the total number of births to 129) and on Christmas day we celebrated the birth of an Eastern Black rhinoceros, bringing our total birth count to 27. Other notable births include 9 clouded leopards, 3 Javan gibbons, 5 rusty spotted cats, 1 Heck’s macaque (the first captive birth outside of their native homeland) and 3 brown hyena pups (our parks are the only UK collection currently holding this species and the first to breed them)

Some new species were also added to the parks’ collections; including Northern Chinese Leopards, ring-tailed lemurs, belted ruffed lemurs and brown hyena. In addition, Howletts and Port Lympne have taken over the captive breeding recommendations (studbooks) for three species; clouded leopards, bush dogs and Scottish wild cats.

Howletts and Port Lympne Wild Animal Park provide a safe environment that encourages rare species to breed in captivity, and the parks also support the in-situ conservation of a number of critically endangered species, working closely with the respective countries governments and local communities to safeguard the future of these species.

We run these meetings in conjunction with Counterpoint Networking, so please click here to find out more.

The primate section at Howletts has been having a busy time recently, with a number of important births over the last few months.

One of the most recent significant successes has been the birth of a Javan gibbon in October. This birth is of particular note because this infant’s sire ‘Ujung’ was diagnosed with diabetes two years ago. At first his condition was managed through strict control of his diet and tablets, but when his condition worsened he started needing daily insulin injections. For Ujung to service, he would therefore need to be willing to accept daily injections from his keepers, which required a lot of positive reinforcement training. After much effort, Ujung is now presenting both arms for his daily injection and is doing fantastically well and we hope to see a steady flow of youngsters swinging around his enclosure for many more years to come.

We run these meetings in conjunction with Counterpoint Networking, so please click here to find out more.

We had a great meeting of the Aspinall Business Club in conjunction with Counterpoint networking – to hear more about the networking, see the Counterpoint Networking website here.

Port Lympne Wild Animal Park has the largest black rhino herd outside of Africa after starting with 3 at Howletts Wild Animal Park. They have been the only zoo to send animals back to the wild but are encouraging others to do the same. They have had 30 births at the park, and 27 have survived. 5 have been returned to Africa, the last ones being returned in 2007 (who have since mated, which is great news). Paul told us that rhinos are usually difficult to breed but they are doing ok at Port Lympne. They have had lots of births, with one last Christmas, and three are suspected to be pregnant now.

Paul told us how he got involved in the work because he had always wanted to work with animals and started working there when John Aspinall was hiring. Paul and Robert Boutwood both agreed that Health and Safety issues have changed the amount of contact keepers can have with animals. But Paul pointed out that everybody also uses their common sense – there are particular animals he would not go into the enclosure with, in particular a current new mum they have at the park.

We learnt that rhinos have bad eyesight but a great sense of smell and hearing!

The new rhino that was born around Christmas time has been named – Nyota (Swahili for Star). The gestation period for rhinos is 15 ½ – 16 months and in the wild the baby stays with their mother until they are 3 years old. In the park however, they remain with their mother until they are 18 months old.

We heard some great stories of transporting animals
• the £30,000 insurance needed just to get them to the airport
• the 2 ½ – 3 days travel
• Paul travelling in the hold with the rhinos to keep them calm (no sleep for him!)

The rhinos are sent back to the wild at about 3 years of age as they tend to adapt better to the wild when they are younger. Paul said they adapt to the environmental changes (when to lie out in the sun and when to stay in the shade and rest) by day two. So far not one of the rhinos that have been sent back has been lost. When they go back to the wild at 3 years old they weight just under a tonne in weight and the crates that they travel in are only 2’ longer and 1’ wider than the animal, to contain them so that they do not injure themselves.

We learnt a little about the palm oil trade and how this is endangering the rhinos’ environment – there is so much demand for palm oil worldwide that these trees are being planted to replace the forest. We will be learning more about this problem at the April meeting. The problem with this deforestation is that isolated pockets of rhino are being created since the forest they would usually move through is being destroyed and this can cause in-breeding or no-breeding.

The poaching of rhinos is at its worst in South Africa and Zimbabwe. Rhinos are poached for their horns which can be worth $30,000 to $60,000 per kilo (about one rhino-worth). In the past horn-removal was trialled to see if this would save the rhinos lives but it was found that when the poachers finally caught up with the rhino they had been tracking and found it had no horn they would kill the animal anyway so that they didn’t ‘waste their time’ tracking it in the future.

We look forward to learning more over the coming meetings.