Our mission
To protect and preserve the planet’s biodiversity for today’s and tomorrow’s generation.

Our aims
At Blackbrook Zoo we believe that conservation is the most important aspect of our existence. Everything we do, from the animals we keep and breed to the education and conservation projects we support and implement both on and off site, are centred on the conservation of the world’s biodiversity.

 

Our Breeding Achievements

The landscape at Blackbrook is home to the largest collection of rare and endangered waterfowl species in Europe, and we actively breed many of the endangered species we keep.

10 of 15 species of rare and endangered Crane live at Blackbrook and we have had great success in the breeding of these magnificent birds over the last decade with current efforts being focused on our two young Eurasian Crane Colts who were born earlier this year and successfully hand reared by their ‘parent staff’ at the park.  

 At present the park’s first Australian Sarus Crane egg sits in one of the incubators at Blackbrook, and whilst the thick shell of the egg gives the question of fertility an element of uncertainty, we hope to have the addition of a third Crane colt to add to our family at Blackbrook before the Summer draws to it’s end.

 Before Blackbrook, Cranes had a reputation of  being difficult to raise in captivity, however in the limelight as hosts of  ‘World of Birds Aviculture Day 2000’, many interested members left Blackbrook Zoo convinced that this was not so. Billy Sumner wrote speaking of the event, ‘following [an] informative talk, Cranes will doubtless be represented in many more collections.’ 

A collective team effort based on the commitment of keepers to try patience, share knowledge, and exist passionately, has acquired Blackbrook a reputation on which it prides itself; for breeding ‘notoriously difficult’ birds in captivity.

In the year prior to the hosting of Avian 2000, Blackbrook’s mother and son owners celebrated their first two major breeding successes, with the first UK breedings of the Lesser Flamingo at their Hillside home and two Marabou Stork chicks reared at Blackbrook. Whilst the latter species can be visited at the park still today, the flock of Lesser Flamingo remain away from the limelight at Hillside – where you can Come and Stay With Us – as one of the only few flocks that breed worldwide.

Blackbrook’s successful breeding of ‘Brian’ the Darwin Rhea, the only one of its kind bred in the UK for 100 years, made headlines in June 2010 as the five week old flightless bird was nurtured by keepers in a bid to protect the threatened species. Brian’s survival into a strong healthy bird has been followed by the birth and rearing of two more Rheas earlier this year.

An immense success in breeding 3 Secretary Birds; an honour rarely achieved in any zoological collection, also deserves mention as one of the park’s many celebrated breeding achievements.

The breeding of other rarely kept birds continues to this day with 2011 marking the successfully hand rearing of the rarely kept Squacco Heron and the Black Faced Ibis and Buff Necked Ibis; the latter of the three being particular notable as our 2 Buff Necked Ibis are the first and only birds of their species to be successfully hand reared in the United Kingdom. 

The breeding of endangered or vulnerable waterfowl and bird species such as the Madagascan Teal, NeNe/Hawaiian Goose, Bronze tail Peacock Pheasant, Vultarian Guinea Fowl, various species of Owl, Turkey Vultures, and waders such as the Black Wing Stilt, Blacksmiths Plover and the Masked Plover, are all regular successes at Blackbrook with many hatchlings and young being cared for by keepers in our Duckery throughout the year.

At Blackbrook we have also had success in recent years breeding Boat-billed Heron, with our latest two additions to the flock hatching just this week, and American White Ibis. Whilst from a conservation perspective both species are classified ‘least concern’, we rank the breeding of these birds under our achievements because of their notorious reputation as being difficult to breed in captivity.

It is not however just birds that we strive to protect at Blackbrook, the critically endangered Visayan Warty Pigs are a new arrival at the park and we are one of just seven zoos in Europe who are attempting to maintain the rare Negros Island variety of this species, which have become extinct on four of the six Visayan Islands that they are endemic to in central Philippines.

Our collection of four species of Lemur, which are also endemic famously to Madagascar, have a long breeding history at Blackbrook. The most recent addition to our collection arrived with the birth of a commonly recognised Ring-tailed Lemur. Although arguably there are more endangered species of Lemur, the Ring-tailed Lemur is considered a Flagship Species due to its recognisability, therefore the successful breeding of this species in captive collections is considered to be of utmost importance with regards to leverage conservation and in effect whole species maintenance via ecosystem protection.

 Although various other reasons have been discussed, the majority of The Breeding Successes at Blackbrook are so special because of the species are endangerment status in the wild. Our 6 White Naped Cranes, for example, are being co-ordinated as a potential breeding group if and when revival of this particular species - which is classified as being ‘vulnerable’ and therefore ‘likely to become Endangered unless the circumstances threatening its survival and reproduction improve’ - becomes necessary. This approach falls neatly in line with The International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s recommendation that captive breeding programmes should be established before populations have become so declined that to remove wild specimens for captive breeding actually risks contributing to their decline in situ. Viable captive populations such as our small flock of three White Naped Crane pairs are therefore co-ordinated as an ‘insurance policy’; providing a genetic reservoir for species recovery should all in situ efforts be unsuccessful.

 Every one of our near threatened, vulnerable, endangered and critically endangered species have a very important job here at the park because they help educate our visitors about species threatened in the wild like the Eurasian Crane and raise awareness of the recovery projects that are currently in situ – such as The Great Crane Project in an attempt to revive the number of birds or animals living in the wild, either within the United Kingdom, across Europe or worldwide.

How the ecology of the landscape relates to our Conservation efforts