Ellis Daw
Eccentric founder of a wildlife park who walked his tiger on a lead and kept elephant dung at home
ELLIS DAW, who has died aged 89, founded Dartmoor Wildlife Park in 1968 and spent the next 38 years doing battle with animal-rights activists, health-and-safety officials and the local council.
He had little time for regulation, and even less for campaigners such as the Captive Animals’ Protection Society. “They’re a bunch of idiots really,” he told the Plymouth Evening Herald. “They’re old biddies … standing there with their glasses and dressed funny.”
In the park’s early days Daw would wander around the centre of Plymouth with a tiger on a lead; in retirement he kept a mound of elephant dung in the corner of his sitting room.
He was given a conditional discharge in 2002 for illegally breeding Siberian tigers, although the court concluded that the inbreeding did not amount to cruelty. “They just didn’t understand,” said Daw. “I was breeding animals and helping save the environment.”
Ellis Bowen Daw was born near Launceston on September 15 1928, the son of Archie and Dorothy Daw; he had three sisters, one of whom died at three days old. The family were dairy farmers and owned Daw’s Creameries.
Young Ellis was given his first guinea pigs at the age of four. His grandmother would take him to Paignton zoo, where he disliked the “bars and concrete enclosures” and resolved that one day he would keep animals “in fields, like my dad keeps his farm animals”.
He claimed to have joined the Home Guard at the age of 11 or 12, when his father drummed into him that they would be the last line of defence in the event of a German invasion.
After the war the family bought land at Sparkwell, near Plymouth, where Daw began collecting wildfowl and got into the timber business.
By 26 he was into stock-car racing. On his first attempt he finished second: “I won 30 quid – a lot of money in those days.”
The wildlife park started one day when Daw, who was minding the farm, “dug a great big pond” and filled it with waterfowl. When his father returned he said: “You’ve bloody well started now, you’d better get on with it.”
In 1968 he opened it to the public. Soon he diversified into big cats, including a couple of tiger cubs from a wildlife park in the Midlands and a pair of lions from “a man in Cornwall who used them as guards at his scrap metal site”.
Sylvester, one of the first tigers, was later stuffed and given pride of place in the park’s restaurant. “You could put your hand in and pat him on the head,” Daw reminisced.
As attitudes to animal welfare and captivity evolved, Daw remained firmly stuck in the past. An inspector’s report in 2001 described the park as “one of the most depressing zoos I have seen”, adding that the enclosures were unsuitable, some areas were unhygienic and children were able to put their fingers into cages holding creatures that could bite.
Dartmoor Wildlife Park closed in April 2006. Following major refurbishment work it reopened in July 2007 as Dartmoor Zoological Park, its new owners being the inspiration for the film We Bought a Zoo (2011) staring Matt Damon and Scarlett Johansson.
In 2011 Daw published his autobiography, From the Lamb to the Tiger, in which he described his journey from sheep farming to keeping big cats while taking more swipes at authority.
In retirement he lived in delightful chaos, surrounded by mountains of paper and memorabilia and regretting having sold up. Before leaving the park he had erected his own memorial stone with the inscription: “Here’s to those who wish me well – and those that don’t can go to hell.”
Ellis Daw’s first marriage to Marie, whom he married when he was 17 and she was 16, was dissolved. He was also divorced from his second wife, Lynne. He is survived by three daughters from his first marriage and by a son and a daughter from his second.
Ellis Daw, born September 15 1928, died March 14 2018