Episode 12 Roar

Today on Roar, you're in for a thriller

when we go in search of the creatures of the night.

But will we find them before they find us?

-Hello, welcome to Roar. I'm Johny.

-And I'm Rani. And these guys

are the park's barasingha deer.

Did you know the word "barasingha" is Hindi for "12 horns"

referring to the 12 antler branches

-coming out of their heads?

-Impressive.

Did you know their antlers can actually grow up to one metre long?

Johny, that's like having your arms sticking out of my head.

Imagine having an arm coming out of your head. Weird.

What would you call these guys without any eyes?

-No idea.

-No-eye deer! Let's get on with today's show.

Coming up on Roar...

A very rare moloch gibbon is due to leave the park,

but is she well enough to travel?

Monty the python has taken a liking to Johny,

but is he friendly...

or hungry?

And Jake the Roar Ranger is helping with the elephants,

which could mean trouble for the film crew.

LAUGHTER

But first I'm rushing up to the moloch gibbon house,

because Jane the vet is about to do a vital health check.

Moloch gibbons are an endangered species.

It's been estimated there's a 50/50 chance they'll become extinct

in the next ten years.

So it's important to try and breed them in captivity.

To help, the park sometimes needs to send

young adults away to start new families in other parks.

Before an animal can be sent to another park,

it has to be given a clean bill of health.

I've come to the moloch gibbon enclosure

-to catch up with Head of Primates, Matt. Hi, Matt.

-Hello.

-What's going on today?

-Jane is currently sedating Simpang.

-OK, Jane the vet.

-Jane the vet.

We need to wait out here until we've got the OK,

then we'll go in and see what happens.

It's quite a serious business to sedate an animal.

-Is Simpang in any danger at the moment?

-No.

Simpang is completely healthy. This is all just routine.

-So she's going to go and get a new home, is she?

-Yeah, that's it.

Do you think we can go in and see how Jane and Simpang are doing?

-Yeah, I think it's fine.

-Follow us inside

and let's find out a little bit more.

'Inside Simpang's bedroom, Jane has already given her a sedative drug

'to send her to sleep, and checked her breathing and heartbeat.

'But there's a lot more to do for the health check,

'so she needs to work fast.'

-Are you all right, Jane?

-Yeah.

-We'll let you do your job.

How many tests do you have to do today?

Basically, we just have to take some blood,

but on that blood, we have to run eight or ten different tests.

So quite a lot for her. But we don't need much blood,

-so again, I don't think she'll notice.

-Will you get results today

-or do you send them off somewhere?

-We send them off.

It will take three weeks for them to come back

so it's a slow, boring process.

-Oh! Jane, they are some big teeth.

-They're really big, aren't they?

Is there a purpose for them? Does she eat meat?

No, she doesn't eat meat. They're mainly for display,

so to show the other gibbons, and it's a form of communication.

They look pretty harsh.

-Oh! Can we have a look at her feet?

-Yeah.

-This is such an honour.

Harder than I thought they were going to be.

-She's got nice little toenails.

-She has! Oh, hello, beautiful.

She is unbelievable. She's got these long nails.

-No-one files these, do they?

-No.

-They're not too sharp.

-She looks after them.

-The toes are very bendy for gripping onto things.

When I look at these, I always think about the gibbons,

their fur looks so thick and fluffy, and it really is.

-Little bit coarse.

-It's not soft.

-It's not soft, but it's very fluffy.

-Then, little hand.

-Really long fingers.

-Yeah.

-Are you artistic?

That's what my mum says if you've got long fingers.

Actually, really big hands. Can I turn your hand over?

If I put her hand next to my hand, it's actually the same size.

-It is. That's amazing.

-That's shocking!

Now we will wake up her up.

How are you going to wake her up?

We going to give her an injection that counteracts the sedatives.

And probably in about ten minutes, she'll be awake again.

So the MOT is now complete,

and Simpang has been given the reversal drug,

so join us later in the show

when hopefully she won't be wobbling around.

Today's Roar Ranger is Jake from Barnsley.

At 11-years-old, he's already got a black belt in taekwondo.

What does he want to do when he's older?

In the future, I would like to work with animals or be a keeper.

I think this will be brilliant training.

And Jake has started his training at home.

He helps look after the family pet, Maggie.

Now let's see if that's going to help him today.

"Jake..."

Oh, cool.

Let's get to it.

How do I get out of here?

Ah!

TRUMPETS

The park has 14 African elephants,

making this the biggest herd in Britain.

Looking after them all is a massive job.

And today is also going to be a very wet one.

It's started chucking it down.

But elephants are waterproof and they still need looking after,

so the work still needs to be done. For the keepers,

rain never stops play.

Hello, I'm Liz, nice to meet you. You must be Jake.

-Yeah, I am.

-You looking forward to today?

-Yeah.

-We've got a huge task ahead of us today.

-What is it?

What you're going to be doing is helping us feed the elephants.

-How does that sound?

-Sounds great!

-Because they're so big,

-they need lots of food so we've got lots of helpers.

-I can imagine that.

We're really pleased you've come to help us.

-Shall we go?

-Yep.

-Lovely.

-You're the boss.

Before they get started on fetching the food,

Jake's getting a look at the herd,

and the rain has made them do something unusual.

Can you see them in the pool, Jake?

-Yeah.

-It's really strange, they only really go in the pool

-if it's really, really hot...

-Or when it's raining.

-Exactly.

More so when it's raining. I don't know why.

I suppose they think, "I'm wet enough, I might as well go swimming."

Now they're more interested in getting breakfast,

and here it is. 43 boxes of oranges, swedes,

cabbages, apples and carrots.

Elephants love their fruit and veg

and they go through a lot more than just five a day.

In fact, each of the adults

chomps through six times Jake's weight in food every day.

The last thing to load is the hay.

Hey, Jake, why aren't you helping?

I'm just watching. I don't want to have sticky, hairy fingers.

Or hay fingers.

He'll be getting "hay fingers" and worse before long,

because next the food has got to be served, and that can be a mucky job

when it's raining like this,

especially if you're standing near Jake.

LAUGHTER

We'll be back out in the rain later on.

-ALL LAUGH

-On the camera!

Whoops!

-What do you get if you sit under a cow?

-I don't know.

A pat on the head. BOTH: Moo!

BOTH: Woof, woof!

BOTH PANT Woof, woof!

-What's grey and goes round and round?

-I don't know.

An elephant in a washing machine.

BOTH GIGGLE

SHE QUACKS

-What bone will a dog never eat?

-I don't know.

-A trombone.

-BOTH LAUGH

ALL LAUGH

Back at the moloch gibbon enclosure, an hour has gone by

since the vet finished doing a medical health check

on the female named Simpang.

She should have woken up from the sedative by now,

so keeper Matt and I are waiting to see how she is.

Oh, here she comes and there's those long arms,

and those long fingers that I got so close to before.

She seems steady, so the anaesthetic's worn off.

That's excellent.

Oh! Let's see, can she swing?

A little bit slow,

-cos these guys are fantastic at swinging, aren't they?

-Yeah.

Hi, darling!

Should I step away a little bit?

Just a little bit.

She hasn't had her morning feed, so she's more hungry than anything.

And look at that...

She's gone for something nice and sweet.

She looks perfectly fine which is brilliant news.

Yeah, definitely.

Now, you did a few tests, it's because you're sending her away!

Yeah, unfortunately.

Why would you do that?

It's very important that they breed.

Moloch gibbons, in the wild, are very few, there's not many at all.

And in captivity, there's even fewer, there's only 40 in captivity.

There's only 40!

-And you've got quite a few here, though.

-We've 19 at the moment,

so we've kind of got half of the captive population.

And, in the wild, where are they from?

Java.

And how many are left out there?

It's between 2,000 and 3,000, so there's not particularly many at all.

Hardly any, then.

So, it's vital for us to breed them.

We're at capacity now, so we need to find somewhere else to breed them,

and this is what's going to happen in America.

High five me on that one.

That is very, very good news.

Well, Matt, that's great about the breeding programme,

and to see Simpang up and about,

stretching those long arms and enjoying a guava...

Today has been a success.

Back up in the elephant field, our Roar Ranger has a problem.

The thing is, to people like Liz, getting mucky is a way of life.

But Jake hasn't quite got used to it yet.

So, why don't you want to put it out?

Cos I don't want to get my fingers all messy.

Oh! I'm sure the rain will wash it off.

JAKE LAUGHS

-Oh! Thank you very much!

-That's all right, you're welcome!

You're lucky it's not poo.

This is clean stuff,

you could be on the cats getting all blood and guts on you.

Then Jake decides to have a go...

-Oh, might as well.

-JAKE LAUGHS

Oh, there's a class bit.

Lovely, thank you very much.

..and discovers that soggy, messy hay isn't so bad...

..and can be fun.

But the fun's just starting, because now it's time to fling the food out.

Just try not to hit anybody else in the process.

Donk!

Right, so get a shovel load...

Watch out, Jake, carrots can be dangerous!

This dumper-truck full is just one of the elephants' daily feeds.

Later, they'll get a supper of more hay plus browse.

Done!

Want to chuck your shovel on there?

Yeah.

Chuck it on.

And it's still raining.

Now to let the elephants out,

and Jake's ready to tackle the next keeper skill -

giving orders on the walkie-talkie.

Coming through, now.

The first out to breakfast is the bull elephant, Jums.

He's the biggest in the herd at five and a half tonnes,

that's the weight of about five cars.

-Ooh!

-JAKE LAUGHS

It'll take the herd less than an hour

to scoff all that food they put out.

I think you've done very well today as a Roar Ranger.

Bit funny about hay, weren't you? At first, but...

You got dirty in the end, that's the main thing.

No, you've been very helpful, thank you.

Shall we go and get dried off?

Yeah, definitely.

Brr!

Today, Jake has experienced two sides of being a keeper -

the good and the bad.

I found being the elephant keeper a really cold job.

And when it's in rain,

it's a bit messy with all that hay sticking to you.

It isn't a very nice day,

but...zookeepers have to go, rain or shine.

I still want to be a keeper...

in the sun, where it's a bit warmer.

Don't really know about rain yet.

Um, there will be a nice warm cup of tea in the house,

so I'll be warm in no time.

Being a real-life keeper can be wet and cold.

But don't forget, you can look after a whole range of virtual animals

from the comfort of your own home.

Just go to the Roar game on the CBBC website.

Today's cheat code is "grass3".

Make a note of that now, you'll need it later

to get food, treats or extra features. Happy gaming.

In the wild, there are many animals that spend all day just snoozing,

because they're active at night.

Lions, for example, often make their kills after dark.

Others, like the red panda, are naturally more active

at dawn and twilight.

So, what goes on at the park after it closes for the evening?

The person to ask is Jim Vassey. He's the head of the big cats,

and the last to leave every night.

It's his job to make sure the place is safely closed down.

Yeah, I'm just locking up, waiting for the last customers to go.

In fact, here they come now.

Cheers, all the best.

Almost done. Just a few more little things to do.

I do a drive-by, make sure the zoo's empty.

I also like to go and see a few animals you wouldn't normally see.

This evening, we're coming out with Jim on his rounds.

It's a great chance to find out what the animals do when no-one's there.

But first, Jim needs to check up on a cat

who's recovering from an operation -

Scabby, the Indian tiger.

This is the best time to see tigers.

Especially Scabs, here, because of her age.

And the heat, she spends a lot of time in the shade or in her shed.

This is always a good opportunity because there's no-one here

and it's nice and quiet.

Hiya, sweetheart. How are you?

At 20 years of age, Scabby is very old for a tiger.

Her general health is quite good

but Jim needs to keep a close eye on her,

especially this evening.

One of the reasons I've come up tonight,

though I come up quite often, is she had a minor operation this morning.

She had an ingrowing claw, which we've had removed by the vet.

And I basically just wanted to check on her. She's still limping,

but here she comes. Hiya, sweetheart.

How's your paw?

You're not happy with us, are you? Eh?

I can see from here, her paw is still quite swollen.

But all things considered, her age, it looks pretty good.

But, with big cats, it's one of these things.

As they get older, they get lazier.

They don't keep their claws sharp enough or short enough.

Hence you get ingrowing claws.

But she's none the worse for it.

You're a good girl.

Checking up on animals that have had problems, like Scabby,

is just one of the things Jim has to do on his twilight rounds.

The place is just mine tonight.

I always drive through the park anyway, to check on stuff.

But you always get the urge to stop and say "hello" to something.

Which is what I'll be doing later. A sneaky peeky at someone else!

The sun's going down but Jim still needs to check

on a creature that kills in the dark,

and pay a visit to the spirits of the night. So, don't go away

cos things are getting spooky around here!

SPOOKY LAUGHTER

Now, there are many things the keepers do

to keep their animals occupied throughout the day.

But when I heard that the rhino section were going bowling

with their rhinos, I thought, "This is taking it too far."

How are the rhinos going to be able

to get their bowling shoes on in the first place?

So we've got a rhino here, I see the bowling balls

and I see keeper, Shelley Kettle.

Shelley, tell me this isn't true.

I'm afraid it is, yes.

One of our weird ways of enriching our rhinos.

We thought we'd give bowling balls a try.

We've heard about other places doing it and thought,

"Let's see what Arusha makes of them."

You're not actually going bowling with the rhinos?

No, we're not!

-Thank you!

-Definitely not.

We're just going to stuff little bits of fruit into the holes

and smear them with banana as well, make it all smell nice.

And put it in the paddock for her and see what she makes of it.

Hopefully she'll knock it around and get a few treats out of it.

Just give her a bit of enrichment, really.

How do I go about feeding a rhino by hand?

-Basically, let them sniff it.

-Yeah.

They decide if they want it and open wide.

-Wow.

-And they pull it in.

Has she got big teeth in there, that I have to worry about?

They have, but they're set really far back.

So she can't bite you very easily.

-So you can put your hand right in there.

-Squash!

But don't try this yourself, kids.

I can only feed this rhino because I'm with a trained keeper.

Otherwise it would be dangerous to even get this close.

She's definitely intrigued. Look at this.

-Shall we get one on the go?

-Yeah.

-Go on, then.

-What have we got?

-Some raspberry, there.

-And is this grape?

-Yeah.

Does she usually have things like this?

It's not anything she usually gets, which hopefully will be nice for her,

make a change. And raspberries smell quite strong as well.

That's it, good girl.

Right, so she's liking the banana.

-She is.

-Right, let's smear this all over the ball, then.

How will she know it's there?

Do you think it's a smell thing or a sight thing?

It'll be quite close to her, so she will be able to see the ball.

But also, it's the smell that she's going to pick up,

that there's food on that ball.

I think you want the rest of my mushy banana! Go on, then.

Let's give her the banana so she's got a taste for it.

-What do you reckon, shall we put the ball in now?

-Yeah.

-Shall we bowl it in?

-You can go first cos you're the expert.

I'm going to get really sticky fingers in these holes.

There's a flaw in the plan! I can't fit in the holes anymore.

Come on, what's this, darling?

So, are you going to put it far away or just leave it nearby?

-I'll just leave it nearby, roll it in and see what happens, shall we?

-OK.

She can smell the banana on my hands, so hopefully she'll go...

Oh, she's seen it.

-What is it, Arusha-roo?

-Wow.

-What is it?

-Look at that.

Oh, banana!

Shelley, out of all the things that you could use for a toy,

why a bowling ball?

Basically, cos they're very strong.

Rhinos are quite capable of breaking most things

and bowling balls are very hard and durable.

The idea is that she can play with it without breaking it.

Well, this has been an interesting experiment.

And although Arusha can't break the bowling ball,

she's not too sure what to do with it either.

Lick it or kick it!

As daylight fades, everything changes.

Now the nocturnal animals, who are active at night,

begin to stir. And Jim Vassey needs to check on them.

Now that the sun's gone down, the park takes on a new meaning.

Now, animals that are nocturnal will start to come to life.

We're now inside the enclosure of a creature whose name,

where they come from, means "spirit of the night".

They can be seen during the day

but they really get active after dusk.

Can't see a thing at the moment.

But I can assure you, they're in here somewhere.

There are seven of them out there in the darkness.

While we can't see them,

they're certainly watching every move Jim makes.

At this time of night, they're not used to people.

That's why I've brought some strawberries, to make friends.

And if you want to make friends with a black and white ruffed lemur,

strawberries are powerful magic.

In fact, these animals are crepuscular,

which means they are most active at dawn and dusk.

I'll give you one more, you've had plenty. Let's find someone else.

Lemurs are a type of primate and, like monkeys,

they've evolved to live mainly in the tree tops.

They've got long limbs and toes that grip like hands.

Take your time.

That's it.

You see? Look at the posture of that. Amazing.

They do this all the time in the wild, but...

Oh! Unfortunately, somebody wanted all of them.

It's amazing that they can just...

Oh, help yourself!

HE LAUGHS

I think that's the last I'm going to see of them... Oh!

That's it, kids. Sorry, all the strawberries are gone.

Although the lemurs are crepuscular,

they are also seen in daytime.

But there are animals here that rarely come out until night.

And now Jim needs to check on them.

I just want to pop up to see these clouded leopards.

These are always active at night.

Hello, Ben.

Beautiful cat. They are true nocturnal cats.

And you quite often find food the next day that we didn't give them.

So they do hunt their own food.

Birds and things like that get in there.

Once they're in there, they're fair game.

This time of night, you wouldn't risk going in there,

because, one, they can see ten times better than us.

They're much quicker, but very dangerous.

Clouded leopards have fantastic night vision and live in the trees.

They hunt in the dark and drop silently for the kill.

The prey never knows a thing until it's all over.

There's a kitten up there, look.

Hi, sweetheart. Hello.

Mum's in there, look. Hiding in the undergrowth, there.

Excellent parents.

Waah-waah.

Yeah, I won't invade their territory tonight.

But it's nice to see them out and about.

But some of the night-time killers

are more likely to be heard than seen.

Can you hear the wolves in the background?

WOLVES HOWL

I can hear an aeroplane but they're howling above the aeroplane.

LOUD HOWLING

That's great.

It's eerie, listening to it in the dark.

But it's still a very good...

Good sign that they're happy, that's the male and the female calling.

There, that was the male, the second one.

And there's one last thing I want to do, as I'm by myself.

Hang on, that's the elephant keeper's shed.

Surely there's nothing nocturnal in there?

What is he up to?

Ah-ha-ha!

My favourite. And Dave's - Jaffa Cakes.

Sorry, Dave, they're mine!

And that shows precisely why some animals are nocturnal -

when the daytime creatures are in bed,

the night dwellers can get away with all sorts of mischief.

SPOOKY LAUGHING

Now, we were about to leave you today,

but then we heard there was a new arrival at the Discovery Zone.

So we popped up to check out head keeper Rich and his new necklace!

Rich, who is this?

This is one of our latest arrivals, this is a carpet python.

And no, we didn't name him this, but he's called Monty Python.

-Wa-hey!

-I like it!

Now, he's got himself wrapped around my wrist here. Are we safe?

Yeah, we're pretty safe. He's pretty harmless to us at this size.

He's quite strong but he's not a threat to us in any way.

He's anchoring himself there, he thinks you're a branch.

He's quite chatty, isn't he? Shh, we're on telly!

He's very beautiful, Rich, but before he gets too friendly with me,

I think we should get out of here. What do you reckon, Rani?

I think that's a good plan!

OK, whilst Johny releases himself from Monty the carpet python,

check out what's on the next episode of Roar. I think he likes you!

I think he does.

Next time...

Yoda the red panda is injured

and must be rushed to the vet for an emergency operation.

But will he survive?

Gorillas are one of our closest relatives in the animal world.

But do we share the same tastes?

That is really hard.

And there are highs...

and lows...

when the gang try to discover why the ocelots pong a lot.

So don't miss it.

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