Donations offer extra enrichment
ANIMALS at Twycross Zoo were treated to some special seasonal greens thanks to donations from a Leicestershire interior landscaping company.
Elephants and gibbons were the prime recipents of the greenery given by Plant Plan of Enderby.
A community partner to Twycross, Plant Plan provides living vegetation for the enclosures, creating both a more natural habitat with foliage cover for the animals and a visual feast for visitors.
And when the opportunity allows the firm also donates leftover plants for a wide range of the zoo’s creatures to enjoy.
One of the latest deliveries included Christmas trees, which were shared between the Gibbon Forest and Elephant Creek.
Zoo staff happily tweeted photos of the animals’ reaction to the fauna.
A spokesman for the zoo said: “We started working with Plant Plan in early 2013 after they approached us having seen a request for donations of any spare house plants.
“The amount of plants we now get is dependent on many things such as the time of year etc but on average we receive one or two cage truck-loads of plants a month, over the course of the year.
“Most are indoor, tropical plants such as palms, dracaena and the like but there will also occasionally be outdoor plants as well such as the olive trees which are now outside the lorikeets. “After the festive season we got some spare Christmas trees which we used for the gibbons and the elephants.”
In linking up with Twycross Zoo, bosses at Plant Plan were keen to do their bit for conservation, particularly in the light of modern threats facing both the plant and animal world.
The firm’s second charity partner is the Grace Trust, a humanitarian aid organisation.
Some 10 per cent of Plant Plan’s profits are donated to charitable giving.
Speaking about the firm’s role, Twycross head keeper Tony Dobbs said: “Large, living plants and trees are essential for the animals we care for at the zoo. As our animals are part of conservation breeding programmes it is important that they can express their natural behaviours in a variety of ways, the plants provide great climbing frames and allow the animals to hide away if they want to. “These plants have the added bonus of making our enclosures look natural, and our visitors can understand how important natural habitats are to our animals. This is an important message particularly as habitats around the world are being destroyed. We are extremely pleased to be working with Plant Plan and are grateful for their support.”