Giant Babies for Mother's Day...
15/03/2022
The past few weeks have seen the birth of no fewer than 5 'giant' donkey foals at the park. Now the weather is better, these can now be seen with their mothers in the small paddocks to the north of the car-parks near to the Zebras. They can exercise here during the day and are taken back into the barns overnight (or in bad weather) whilst they are still young.
The latest babies are two Poitou Donkey jenny foals, jet black at this stage with their shaggy dark brown mums.
A little older are three American Mammoth Jackstock foals, two spotted jennies and one black jack. These will probably be the last young American Mammoths to be seen at the park as our stud of these endangered donkeys is being dispersed to private breeders in Europe at the end of 2022. We will keep some of the older non-breeding jennies, but will no longer be breeding them. This will allow the land used for these animals to be incorporated into plans already in place to add several new species to the Zoo's collection over the next few years, including an enlarged paddock for our existing Grant's Zebras.