The Scottish Fire & Rescue Service are playing in a charity match against Livingston Boys under 16's on Friday 24th May to raise money for the Zoo Fire Fund. Kick off is @ 6pm at West Calder Junior's Park, Hermand Park, West Calder, tickets £4 per adult and £1 per child, includes a free raffle ticket. Either pay on the night or call Tracey 07508 358783 for tickets. Thank you all!
Two lovely wee baby marmosets born recently at the Zoo:)
We are delighted that Leaping Lemurs will re-open this weekend from 10am - 6pm (last admission at 5pm) and will remain open thereafter as normal. The Zoo is also open as normal from now on.
Many thanks to the guys from Scottish Hydro who were painting and cleaning up around the Zoo and soft play area last week - we really appreciated thier help and also all the other volunteers involved and indeed for everyone's support and donations.
Many thanks to the 9th West Lothian Scout Group for their bag packing sessions at Sainsburys Livingston last weekend. Beavers, cubs, scouts and venture scouts all helped to raise a staggering £1674.22! thanks of course also to Sainsburys for kindly offering this to us. We also are very grateful to the fantastic volunteers who were busy cleaning the Leaping Lemurs play area on Saturday and Sunday - brilliant job and ready now for the painters!
Great to see our three gorgeous brown bears enjoying the sunshine - Carmen's pictured here having a roll on her back! Remember Zoo is open this weekend, free admission from 10 - 5pm each day.
Please note that Leaping Lemurs soft play area will not be open this weekend for health and safety reasons. The reptile house was demolished today and both the site and surrounding area is now securely fenced off. Many thanks to Dem-Master for offering their services free of charge.
We cannot praise highly enough the support we received from the fire brigade, police and other officials at the Zoo on Sunday. The quick response from the fire service contained the fire very quickly and allowed the rescue of the crocodiles, otter and 2 meerkats - all are recovering well thankfully.
A devastating fire has destroyed the reptile/tropical house, unfortunately lives have been lost but amazingly the crocodiles, housed next to the reptile house have survived thankfully. One of our beloved otters has died, but the female is being cared for by the vet and we are hopeful she will survive. The Zoo and soft play will be closed today and we thank everyone for their support and offer of help.
Hey! If you are not busy today, why not come and "hang" out at the Zoo, suns out and so are the animals:)
... the ruffed lemurs love a tickle under the arm!
Great to see Buster and Chloe over the past couple of days, they go overwhere together now:)
The Zoo is open as normal today -so hope you can come along and get up close to the animals - have a go at our Easter Treasure
hunt as well!
when Peggy, Carmen and Suzy arrived at the Zoo and Suzy celebrated this morning with a roll on her back:) Thanks to EVERYONE who helped make this possible.
Hope they can untie themselves from this mess!
Meet Chloe our gorgeous new Lynx, she arrived last night and is settling in well.
Our new stick insects in the Tropical House are fantastic!
...a new friend who will hopefully arrive at the Zoo this evening:)
Come and join in with our Easter celebrations - we have an Easter Treasure Hunt on the Sunday, face painting, raffle, an egg for the kids plus a chance to see all the changes that have been happening over the winter!
Hope to see you soon - the log fire is on!
..are not amused with all this snow! Cheer up boys, Spring is not far away?
Fab to watch Suzy this morning enjoying the woods and snow - she was one happy bear.
The film crew were out and about in West Lothian today and they came to film some of the animals in the snow:)
The new "Brown Bear Cafe" opened at the weekend, the fire was roaring today so lovely and cosy:)
..at the Royal Bank of Scotland, West Calder for putting on a super coffee morning today to raise funds for the Zoo - Danielle pictured below was busy selling raffle tickets and pouring coffee and tea, whilst Lynne had been busy baking yesterday and the cakes were very yummy! Thanks also to everyone who called in this morning to support us - the raffle tickets will be on sale until Friday this week and there are lots of great prizes to be won by local companies who have generously donated them.
We are busy building a new enclosure for the African Grey parrots - the old goat hut has been knocked down, the goats are now up beside the donkeys and micro pigs and if the weather gets a bit warmer, the birds will hopefully soon be in their new home (they are still inside keeping warm just now!)
can you fit on one log...lots!
Suzy, deep in thought - either that or watching for the next lot of snow to start!
Just a wee reminder to switch on to BBC4 tonight @ 9pm if you want to find out all about the leaf cutting ants and their incredible journey before arriving at the Zoo. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00scslp
Apologies to anyone who has tried to telephone the Zoo this morning (12th March), we are having problems with the line and hope to rectify this asap. In the meantime, you can contact us by email to : This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. Sorry for any inconvenience.
A huge thank you to the pupils and staff at Armadale Academy for the £445 we have just received for the bear appeal! What a terrific fundraising effort and we are extremely grateful:) ...thermometer gets ever nearer to the £80,000 mark..
Taken earlier today, Buster doesn't seem phased by the Scottish weather!
Checkout BBC4, this Tuesday @ 9pm, when the programme "Planet Ant" will follow the journey of a huge colony of leaf cutting ants from Trinidad to the Glasgow Science Museum where they were temporarily on show. They will now be on show at the Five Sisters Zoo which is their new permanent home - all one million of them! They are fascinating and hopefully you will come and see them soon at the Zoo and learn more about them.
have just moved into their new home - you can now find them alongside the ringtailed lemurs. They were outside exploring their new play area today and were making plenty of noise as usual. The brown lemurs have moved into their old enclosure and the snowy owls will move into the brown lemurs old enclosure!
Our dwarf mongoose is loving his new enclosure, which he shares with the yellow mongoose and the porcupines. Result!
Wow! What a fantastic surprise to open an envelope and find a lovely letter and cheque for £500 for the bear appeal! A massive thank you to the Charities Committee at Mark & Spencer Southampton for this amount, that you raised over the Christmas period with a raffle. Considering we are at the other end of the country to you, we are delighted that you decided to donate to the bears and this will help us edge nearer to our target of £80,000. Think Suzy's listening out for the postman now! Big hugs to you all from Carmen, Peggy & Suzy xxx
Work is well underway with the new zoo entrance, ticket desk and shop ( this was previously the coffee shop) so we are hoping this will help the flow of visitors entering and leaving the Zoo :)
The otters are settling in well and seem to be very happy in their fab new home! Hope you will come and see them soon:)
It's lovely and sunny at the Zoo today and
the meerkats are enjoying every minute of it!
One of our red squirrels enjoying a wee snack today - they will be moving enclosures soon, as two new pine martins will be moving in there!
Our bat earred foxes have settled in well to their new enclosure and are loving this sunny sheltered spot.
Many thanks to the Countryside & Convervation Club for their help last weekend to clear out the otter pond. When the otters move to their great new home, then we can welcome a new addition to the Zoo - beavers!
The group were also helping clear out the old duck pond as we will be introducing pond dipping for school groups soon - a chance to really get hands on!
The construction of the new pool for our two crocodiles is well underway and forms part of the "Living Wonders of the World" area, that will be opening in the coming weeks.
Work is well underway contructing a new home for the brown lemurs who will move up to be next to the ring tailed lemurs in the near future:) These guys are extremely cute, but a little shy sometimes.
Suzy has also been out stretching her legs this week, she has denned up over the winter in the holding pen indoor area.
We are all very excited to see work progressing well in our new exhibit "Living Wonders of the World". We are creating a walk through indoor area which will bring to life the sights, sounds and feel of the rainforest, desert and tropical areas of our world. This is all happening in what used to be the ticket desk/gift shop and reptile house, so you will still be able to see many of our existing creatures, as well as some new ones. Our crocodiles will also move into a new pool area in here.
