It didn’t have to be done but on Saturday we made a farewell visit to Bristol Zoo, which closes forever on 3rd September. I’ve been going to the zoo in one guise or another for over 50 years, as a child, a parent and now as a trainee old person. The experience was not a bad one but our overall conclusion was that its closure is not coming a moment too soon.
It’s not so much that the zoo is tired and fading. My main feeling was that it was almost exactly the same as when I visited, perhaps 15 years ago, maybe longer. The only difference that there were less animals to gawk at in their cages and other assorted areas. By the end of our visit, I was as sleepy as the big cats appeared to be.
Most of the big beasts have long gone. The elephants, giraffes, hippos and the tragic polar bears but a distant memory. Even twilight world has closed down and bug world isn’t quite the same without the funnel web spider in the toilet type exhibit.
As man destroys the habitats of so many animals and slaughters so many others, I still support the principle of zoos. Bristol’s conservation record is excellent, as are the records at so many other zoos worldwide. But the main exhibits at Bristol appeared to be exotic birds. I was quickly birded out. My favourite exhibit was the butterflies, who are stunningly beautiful for the entirety of their six weeks of life.
I wondered if I might feel a wave of nostalgia wash over me as we came to the end of our visit but instead I felt nothing. I didn’t take a single photograph because I didn’t think there was anything worth photographing. Bristol zoo was nice while it lasted but in its current and final form I won’t miss it at all.
