and here's one of our shy porcupines out inspecting what had been done:)

...was what the volunteers from HSBC kindly helped out with this morning, followed by a lot of bark shovelling into the wallabies - a massive thank you to all of them, especially with all the heavy rain today - really appreciate your help guys.

Another huge thank you goes to our HSBC volunteers from yesterday who were busy cleaning signs for us and painting in one of the owl enclosures...really appreciate your help:)

A massive thank you to the volunteers today from HSBC and for helping with the paths and sanding the trailer - great job.

Here's a bear sized yawn from Carmen, but watch out when looking at the photo as it makes you want to yawn too!

..our albino burmese python has the right idea of suggling up today, to keep warm:)

A massive thank you to 10 pupils and 4 members of staff who have just presented us with a cheque for £500 for the bear fund from their aerial assault course challenge that they completed on the 9th March. This is fantastic effort and is greatly appreciated:)

Please oh please let the rain stop:)

Suzy takes a snooze in the woodland area, sweet dreams beautiful bear:)

2 new babies who are very cute!

A massive thank you to everyone who took part in the teddy bears picnic yesterday - June and Eva reckon that around £1500 has been raised for the bears and that's before the sponsor money comes in and Julia Attwoods sponsorship total is added for her two bears Minnie and Cornelius who came all the way from America to participate!  Thank you all...Suzy smiling:)

Enjoy your day and good luck to all taking part in the teddy bears walk and picnic today at Craigton House, we are busy getting the animals ready to take there for the petting zoo - lots of fun activities planned and am sure it will be a great day:)

Good, coasts clear!

Better make sure no ones watching!

Wondering what she can do with this tree?!

Have you ever seen an otter sunbathing! Lovely to see all the animals enjoying the sun today.... and visitors to of course:)

We love wildcats!

We're looking forward to this weekend and the sponsored walk/teddy bears picnic at Craigton House.  Thanks so much to June, Angela and everyone who has helped organise this and for either participating or sponsoring a bear - you are all great and your support is really appreciated!  We'll be there with a selection of animals to say hello! 

Our thanks once again go to the lovely volunteers from HSBC who helped out at the Zoo today - putting bark in the ruff lemur enclosure, lots of weeding and painting of fences....much appreciated:)

Fabulous photo of our female European Eagle Owl feeding her chick yesterday - captured by Eileen, one of our wonderful volunteers:)

We managed to raise £494.00 for the bear appeal at Ocean Terminal, thanks to everyone who helped support the event:)

We had a great time at Ocean Terminal today - thanks to everyone who helped make this event happen and to everyone who popped in to meet the animals and donate to the bear appeal :)

Spring is here and so are the first of our babies - two meerkat babies were spotted out with their parents yesterday and congratulations to the European Eagle Owls - mum has successfully hatched her two chicks and they have been seen poking out from under her this week:) They are a bit camera shy just now, but we will do our best to get a few snap shots soon!

We're all set for Ocean Terminal tomorrow (11 - 4pm) with the petting zoo  - great raffle prizes on offer from Frankie & Bennys, Build a Bear, Pure Spa and includes a season pass for the Zoo.  Hope to see you there - all funds raised will go to the bears!

The Zoo will be at Ocean Terminal this Saturday, 28th April as part of a fundraising day to raise money for the bears.  This is thanks to the support of Ocean Terminal, Build a Bear, Frankie & Benny's and Pure Spa all of whom will be there with give away goodie bags and lots of fantastic raffle prizes to be won! 

Our thanks go to Neil Findlay, MSP, who lodged the following motion on the 6th April at the Scottish Parliament : "That the Parliament welcomes the arrival of Carmen, Peggy & Suzy, three circus bears rescued from a Belgian Circus, to the Five Sisters Zoo, West Calder; notes their specially built sanctuary at the zoo, complete with waterfall and indoor and outdoor enclosures; congratulates the owner, Brian Curran, his staff and volunteers who it consdiers worked tirelessly to raise the money necessary to bring the bears to Scotland; looks forward to the animals enjoying what it sees as their vastly improved living conditions, and wishes the zoo every success in the future." (S4M-02586 Neil Finlay, Scottish Labour)

Carmen out yesterday for a morning "sniff" and wander round the woodland area.

The raffle was finally drawn on Easter Sunday for the beautiful bear painting - "Looking Forward" generously painted and donated by Gordon Corrins.  The VERY lucky winner was Claire McSweeney, 2nd and 3rd prizes ( limited prints of the painting) went to Mike Knipe and Maraget Hill.  There are limited edition prints now for sale in the shop; A4 @ £35unframed, double mounted or A3 size for £65.  Bronze Framing are also offering a discount on framing - thank you all for raising a total of £500.04!

...is currently getting laid out next to the ice cream parlour and will be ready soon.

The Zoo will join in with the 50th celebrations for Livingston this weekend by bringing the petting zoo along to the Centre from 11am tomorrow (14th April).  Hope to see you then:)

A massive thank you to everyone who has taken the time to visit the Zoo this Easter and to support the arrival of the bears - especially with the weather this week which has included a dusting of snow!

Clear blue skies at the Zoo this morning - Suzy's already out in the wooded area having a roam about.

If anyone didn't manage to catch the One Show on Monday night, then have a look at this - its about half way through the show :)  a special thanks to Alison for such a lovely feature about the bears.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01fhwb5

The bears got a taste of the good old Scottish weather yesterday going from 20 degrees when they arrived to a snow blizzard in a matter of days! Carmen didn't seem bothered with her beautiful fur to keep her warm.

Our beautiful European Eagle owl is sitting on eggs, hope they have been nice and warm under mum these past few wintery days!

Just a quick reminder to watch the One Show tonight, BBC 1 @ 7pm - the bears are on!

Watch out for the story of Carmen, Peggy and Suzy on the One Show tonight - BBC 1 at 7pm!  The show followed Shirley & Brian to Belgium and filmed the journey back to the Zoo with the arrival and settling in of the bears :)

..are loving this weather and the new surface in their enclosure.

A proud moment : captured yesterday of Brian, in front of the inner sanctuary area.  Months of hard work paying off with the happiest of endings:)

We didn't feature on the 6pm news, but atleast there is footage of Peggy on-line : http://news.stv.tv/scotland/east-central/302006-rescued-circus-bears-arrive-at-west-lothian-zoo/

Meet Peggy as she steps out into the outdoor area of the holding pen for the first time this morning:)

All bears have been out and are recovering from the long day yesterday.  Slightly anxious so they are needing time to settle and get to know the zoo keeping staff who are so delighted to have them here after months of planning.

Carmen, Peggy & Suzy arrived at the Zoo last night around 11.30pm!  They were taken straight down to the enclosure and the careful process of unloading them, weighing them (in their crates) and trasnderring each of them into a seprate den was successfully done by around 1.00am. It's a wonderful day for the Zoo:)

The bears arrived around 11.30pm, are safely unloaded and all is well up at the enclosure.  What a night - they are AMAZING!!  This is literally them coming through the gates into the carpark....

This was the holding pen area this afternoon, everything ready and we are all waiting to welcome the bears and settle them in..... well done to all the staff and helpers who have done a fantastic job of finishing everything off in time:)

The convoy is well on their way and making good progress up the M6, not long now Carmen, Peggy & Suzy.

Just got a message from Shirley that the bears are all loaded and ready to leave at 8.30am!  Safe journey and see you all soon!

Shirley & Brain arrived in Belgium this afternoon and met with Matthew from Specialist Wildlife Services, who will start early tomorrow morning, loading the bears into their specially built crates, ready to start their journey!

Shirley & Brian left for Belgium this afternoon and will arrive there tomorrow afternoon.  Brian will get to meet the bears for the first time - will keep you posted over the next couple of days as the bears get placed in their crates and their journey to Scotland starts.....SO EXCITING!

We had our official Scottish Government Zoo inspection visit for the bear enclosure on Thursday and it PASSED WITH FLYING COLOURS! (pending a final local inspection next Wednesday to check the last 3 metal panels that were not fixed in place).  That's us then, the countdown is on with only 5 more sleeps till Carmen, Peggy & Suzy arrive at the Zoo:)

We are all loving this sunny, dry weather - especially the parma wallabies, caught here having a snooze after lunch:)