Episode 21 Roar

Today on Roar, the dramatic story of what happened

when a hurricane hit the park and two of the largest tigers escaped.

-Hello and welcome to Roar. I'm Rani.

-And I'm Johny. And these monkeys

-are the dusky langurs.

-They are called Old World monkeys

because they come from places like Africa and Asia.

This particular species can be found in Thailand and the Malay Peninsula.

But you won't mistake these guys. Take a look at the white rings

around their eyes, which is why they are also called spectacled langurs.

Keep YOUR eyes peeled because we have a jam-packed show coming up.

On Roar today... The gang are out to discover why the macaque monkeys

always go for that crazy hairstyle.

Do you fancy a game of footy with this...?

That weighs a ton!

..The elephants do!

And what on earth is Johny doing

with a fishing rod, a toy seagull

and Winnie the honey badger?

You'll have to watch the show to find out!

First, though, we've got the story about the time when a hurricane

blew through England, and terror stalked the park.

But the tale starts today, very early in the morning

when the place is deserted, except for one keeper -

Chris from Big Cats.

OK, right, I'm at the park a lot earlier than everybody else

and the main reason for this is that we're doing the cat check,

which is something we do every day

before anybody else is allowed into the park.

We're checking to make sure all of our nice, big carnivores

are still within the enclosures, and also that the enclosures are safe,

nothing's happened to them that might allow the animals to escape.

So, Chris is in early to check

that none of the park's bloodthirsty killers have escaped.

Hello, girl, how are you doing?

One of the people who helps keep everyone safe and secure

is Adrian Harland. These days, he works in the office

but he used to do Chris's job.

For my first 15-odd years, I worked on the Large Carnivore section here

at Port Lympne. It was a wonderful time.

I got to know a number of these cats quite well.

In fact, he hand-raised one of our favourites on Roar,

Tug the Siberian tiger, when he was just a little cub.

Back when Adrian first started working here,

keepers sometimes went in with animals that had been hand-raised,

even after they'd grown up. But, of course, that was very dangerous

because every big cat is absolutely deadly,

and no-one has been in with any of them for many years now.

One of the most important things when dealing with big cats

is health and safety. We try and keep all the animals safe

and in their enclosures. We don't like to have any escapes at all.

However, these are probably the group of animals we least want to have out

because these are the ones that hunt, and we don't want to end up as prey.

Tug is wonderful and if he got out, he'd be down at the burger bar,

queueing up peacefully, waiting for it to open.

But they're not all like that. Some of them would like to see

the back of your head, because they'd have you,

so the first job in the morning for the Large Carnivore section

is to make sure that all of the big cats are where they should be.

And this morning, Chris still has a few more carnivores to find.

Hello! We've supposedly got five Barbary lions in this enclosure,

a nice little family group. I can see two of them so far.

How are you doing? OK, that's three.

There have been scary moments where we've come down

to one of the enclosures and we've searched and there's just one cat

that we cannot find. That's when you start watching your back

outside the enclosure as well just in case they're somewhere around you.

Luckily, Chris has never had to deal with a big-cat escape.

But Adrian has. He once had two tigers on the loose,

-and it was all because of the trees.

-These tigers come from the forests

of Siberia. We like to give them the same kind of habitat here.

Overnight, if there's been some wind, a tree could come down,

it could knock the fence down and we could have an animal out.

And that has happened, yes.

It was on a dark and stormy night

and it's quite a tale. Stay tuned to find out what happened

when two of the largest big cats in the world escaped.

Oh, she's a big un! She's a big 'un!

There we go. It's not a fish, it's a bird. And you might think that's odd

but there is an explanation for this, because I'm here

with Jim and Mark, and we've got an experiment with a honey badger.

In the wild, honey badgers would follow birds

-to get their ideal meal - honey. Isn't that right, guys?

-Yes.

I've got some here to prove it. Some honey. This is for her.

What I'm going to do, whilst you and Mark distract her,

is quickly hide this in her enclosure and then you'll come around

and hopefully she'll follow that and you'll take the bird to the honey,

-she'll follow and get the reward at the end.

-This really happens

-in the wild? They follow a bird to get honey?

-That's right.

-How does it work?

-It's co-operation. The bird wants the honey

but can't get it because the bees are quite nasty

and the stings are very potent. But a honey badger doesn't worry

-about stings.

-Doesn't the badger have all the honey and forget the bird?

No, it seems the honey badgers are pretty good, they leave a bit

-for the bird. Not a lot, just enough.

-So they co-operate?

-That's right.

So, Jim, can we go in there WITH the honey badger?

No, unfortunately not. This is a very dangerous animal.

Everyone knows that this is the most dangerous animal in the park!

That's why you and Mark are going to go off that way and distract her,

while I go in her enclosure to hide the honey.

So there's no pressure on us, then, Mark!

-If we get it wrong, Jim will lose a leg.

-Well, I've got two!

You're a brave man, Jim! OK, if you want to go and hide the honey.

Mark, we better try and do something with this badger over here.

What have we got to distract the honey badger?

-I brought with me one of her other favourite foods, a rat.

-Right.

Winnie!

So, Mark, is Jim good to go in?

Yeah, if you want to give him a quick shout.

Jim, you can go in the enclosure now, we've got Winnie here.

OK, so we better keep her here then.

She's got very sharp teeth, hasn't she?

Yeah, she's actually quite an old animal,

so they're a lot more worn down

than they would be if she was in her prime.

But still, they can lock their jaws as well,

so even if they are blunt teeth,

she's not going to let go very easily.

Right. Wins!

Jim, she's got the rat.

Do you think Jim's going to be all right in there, then?

Well, I hope so.

We've managed to keep her distracted for quite a while now,

so hopefully he should be out

and have all his fingers and toes still intact.

Join us in part two later on in the show

to see if that IS the case and Jim is all right,

and our honey badger follows this bird to its meal.

It's time now for Ask The Keeper.

Now, the keeper in question today is head keeper, Matt Ford.

This lot have got loads of questions. Unfortunately, Matt,

they're all about lion-tailed macaques,

but I've heard it's actually about boxing, is that right?

Slightly true. We're going to chuck some boxes in with them today.

-A bit of enrichment.

-Right.

-Just to give them something to do

-while you're asking the questions, really.

-OK, let's have a look.

-That looks appetising(!)

-No, I know. It's basically just all bits of wood,

mixed in with nuts.

So they'll have to rummage through to get the nuts out, basically.

OK, do you want a hand chucking them in or will you do the honours?

I'll chuck 'em in, just so we can clear the electric fence,

we don't want them landing there.

Watch the fence. Good throw!

Anyone going to come over?

-Check him out.

-How do they know how to get into the box?

Macaques are very inquisitive,

they'll rip apart anything that we give them,

so they'll destroy it to see what's inside. So they just do it naturally.

-How do they get into the nuts?

-Their teeth are designed to get into nuts.

They put them to the back of their teeth, into their molars,

which are powerful and strong, and they crack them that way.

-Are they endangered?

-Lion-tailed macaques are, there's only a couple

of thousand left in India and the Western Ghats, where they came from.

Due to many reasons, mainly deforrestation and habitat loss,

but they were also hunted as well. It's not good.

-How long do they live?

-They can live to quite a good age.

In the wild it'll be around 30, so they do live quite old.

In captivity you can increase that slightly, to about 40, 45.

So they're quite long-lived.

-Do they get grey when they get old?

-They don't actually go grey at all.

All they are is grey around their face, but they'll stay jet-black.

-Are they good climbers?

-They are.

In the wild, they live all their life in the canopy.

They don't come down to the floor at all.

In captivity it's a bit different, they don't have the natural predators

they would on the floor, so they're more likely to be on the ground.

But they are really good climbers and will go to the tops of poles

in their enclosure and swing on the ropes.

I think you're doing quite good so far, but I think we're going

to give you a killer question. Guys, come over here.

Excuse us one second, watch the boxes.

THEY WHISPER

OK, come on, then.

We have done our research, we have a question for you.

How many species of macaques are there around the world?

Off the top of my head, I'd say...nine.

RANI LAUGHS

I'm so sorry to laugh - did you say nine?

-Yeah.

-There are actually 21. What do you think to that?

Um, I'm a bit embarrassed now. That's not very good, is it?

Not very good at all, but I can tell you

lion-tailed macaques are one of the rarest of them.

What do we think - thumbs up or thumbs down?

Ooh, they're harsh, aren't they? Matt, I'm going to give you

a thumbs up cos I learned loads, thank you very much.

Make sure you join us next time on Roar for more Ask The Keeper.

-What do you call a cat that swallowed a lemon?

-I don't know.

A sour puss!

How do cats greet each other at Christmas?

A furry merry Christmas and a happy meow year.

Owwww!

-What do you get when you cross a honey bee with a bear?

-I don't know.

Winnnie the Pooh.

Earlier on in the show, myself and Mark came up with an idea

to try and lure the honey badger to its honey

with this bird guide, cos they do that out in the wild.

Jim bravely went in there and planted some honey in the enclosure.

-You're still alive, Jim, you're doing all right?

-Yeah, just about!

-Are we ready to do this, then?

-Go for it.

Let's see if it'll follow the bird. It's quite interested, look at this.

We're getting close to the honey now.

I can see you've put the honey in there.

She seems to be following it.

Once she's smelt the honey, do you think she'll leave the bird alone

and be more interested in the honey?

She'd follow it, she wouldn't attack it.

-She relies on it to find the honey. There you go, look.

-She's found it.

I want to test out your theory,

see if Winnie really would leave the bird alone,

I'm going to put the bird in there, is that OK?

Drop it down, see what she does.

Oh!

This bird has no harmful parts, it won't hurt Winnie?

No, that's why we're using it,

-because there's no parts that will hurt her.

-Right, brilliant.

-It's a bit of fun for her.

-This is kind of a seagull,

but apart from the honey guider, will they attack other birds?

They'll eat anything.

-Really?

-They'll attack anything.

You, me, lions, hyenas, leopards, everything.

They are not afraid of anything.

Jim, she's taken the honey off into the bushes somewhere.

What do you think she'll do with it once she's got it?

Normally she'll take her food underground to her den

and eat it at her own leisure.

They love digging, she's got a few different tunnels underneath

-this enclosure, hasn't she?

-Yeah, more than a few.

-Really?

No-one really knows how many, or how far they go under or anything.

She's got a particular den that she likes to take her food,

sometimes she'll take all her food down there and stay down and eat.

Or sometimes take it down, store it, come back.

-So she prefers to eat in private?

-Yeah, sometimes.

The honey badger's had its honey. And you know what?

It's made a mess of our bird in the process.

I didn't believe they were so dangerous before this experiment,

but now I can say that honey badgers are definitely king of the park!

Every single day, first thing in the morning, one of the big-cat keepers

checks that none of their predators have escaped. That HAS happened!

And the last time was when the park was hit by an incredible storm.

Now we're going back in time to hear the full story.

In 1987, the then-head cat keeper banged on my door,

it was about 3 o'clock in the morning, he said,

"It's getting very windy out there,

"I think we ought to go around and just have a quick check on the cats."

We set off into the park to go round and check the cats.

As we came in at the top of the park,

I got blown off my feet and landed on my bottom.

It wasn't just a bit windy,

the park was in the grip of a full-blown hurricane,

the like of which hadn't been seen in Britain for 200 years.

The dangers was if trees were blown over, they could crush the fences

and that would allow the animals to escape.

So, the keepers were trying

to get them safely into their sheds and houses.

It was a night that Neville Buck will never forget.

On the night the hurricane happened,

there was a horrendous amount of noise. Myself and a colleague,

we had been allocated our area, making sure all the small cats

and the clouded leopards and things like that were where they should be.

We were actually walking through the woodlands

with trees crashing down around our heads.

As Neville set off to save the small cats,

Adrian was approaching the big-cat section.

When we got down onto the main drive down here, there were two tigers out.

What did he just say?

When we got down onto the main drive down here, there were two tigers out.

My first thought was, "Who are they?"

Because it was dark and we had torches

but couldn't really see too well.

Tigers make a kind of greeting noise, "Fffff, ffffff!" kind of sound,

and we were approaching them with our torches and they fuffed at us.

Luckily, it was two of the hand-reared tigers that had escaped.

Tigers aren't driven purely by a killing instinct.

They were scared, and I was, too, to be honest.

They came up to us, they were rubbing up against our legs

because the trees were coming down.

They just wanted to be put where they'd be safe,

and when we led them into the shed,

they went into the shed and we shut the door on them

and we just hoped that nothing would hit that shed.

So, Adrian managed to walk two tigers into safety.

But, on the other side of the park,

Neville was getting close to the lions' enclosure.

Find out what happened there a little later on.

All right, there's an emergency, there's an emergency,

I haven't got time to talk, I'm here with my hosepipe,

I'm at the ellie section. Jen, where's the fire, I'm ready to go!

There's no fire, don't worry.

We're going to use this to make some toys for the elephants.

Right, you want to use a fire hose to make toys for the ellies?

-What are we going to make?

-We're going to make some fire-hose cubes.

Actually, I've already made them, but I'm going to tell you about them.

-OK.

-Then, later on put them in with the elephants.

-I like the sound of that. I'm guessing these are them here?

-Yeah.

Impressive! You've weaved all this, it's all just old hose.

-Where's the hose from?

-The hose came from a fire brigade,

-it's all condemned, so it can't be used any more.

-Excellent.

Instead of wasting it, we managed to talk them into letting us have some.

I'm very impressed with your skills, cos they look unbelievable.

What do you think the ellies will make of it?

I'm hoping they'll kick them around, pick them up, throw them around.

But you never know. It's just something to give them to do, really.

All right, enough chat.

I want to see what the ellies do with their new big cubes!

-OK.

-We've got one here.

You said it was heavy,

-but it shouldn't be a problem for us ladies.

-Feeling strong?

That weighs a ton! I think we need to bring in the big guns.

Now, you guys, you all stand around and watch,

can we have a bit of help, please?

There you go, finally get this lot doing some work.

Join us later on in the show when, hopefully,

this will be in the ellie enclosure

and the ellies can have a good kick around.

They're so strong!

Now, if you're a Roar gamer, you'll want to make note of this -

grass33, that's today's cheat code.

And if you're not a Roar gamer, why not give it a go?

You'll find it on the CBBC website and it's great fun.

We've got the fire-hose cube into position.

Now all we need are the ellies.

OK, ready.

Now, how many ellies are going to come out here?

Only two. Just mother Lara and her daughter Issa.

So am I going to be able to tell the difference between Lara and Issa?

-Yeah, Lara's got the long tusks.

-That's Mum.

Yeah, and Issa is just coming through the gate,

-she's got the little pegs sticking out.

-Aw!

One little sniff and then walked away? Lara!

Well, at least they touched it.

Jen was like that, "Please, please play with it!"

You're right, because it is something new in their enclosure,

sometimes they need a little bit of time to get used to it.

Yeah, they might just be like, "Ooh, what's that?"

Also, they've got their breakfast out here as well,

cos they're going to spend most of the day out here.

We need to keep them occupied with food and stuff.

Maybe when that runs out, they might come and play with it again.

There you go, Jen. She may have her food in her mouth,

but she's still sniffing out the cube.

It'll be full of lots of new smells and stuff,

so she's interested to see what it is and where it's been.

We've had a little bit of interest in the cube,

do you think they're avoiding it cos of the colour?

Does red signify danger to ellies, are they a bit nervous?

No, I don't think so. Have you seen the size of them?

I don't think they're scared of many things.

So, no, colour shouldn't bother them,

they can see the same amount of things that humans can.

They've got all their food out here,

I don't want to rush their breakfast or lunch or whatever this may be,

but do you think they're going to be at that for a while?

-Yes, probably.

-They're not going to play with this cube

-until they finish that?

-Yeah, that's right.

Which is only right,

you can't go out and play until you've had your meal.

Would it be OK if we left our cameraman, Adam, here

to keep an eye on the cube?

Once they have finished and come and have a play,

-we'll catch all the action.

-Sure.

Thank you. Adam, are you happy with that? You going to stick around?

Don't look at me, look at the cube!

Thank you.

And, sure enough, when she's finished her food,

young Issa is up for a bit of footie.

But hang on, what do the rules say about using your trunk?!

Does that count as a hand ball?

One night, over 20 years ago, a freak hurricane

tore through the Southeast of England.

At the park, trees were blown over and fences were damaged.

The keepers were sent out into the storm

to make sure the dangerous big cats hadn't escaped.

Two tigers got out,

but luckily they were both hand-raised and quite friendly.

Meanwhile, the patrol sent to check on the lions

couldn't reach their enclosure.

And that left Neville Buck in a terrifying situation.

We were down at the fishing cats, just above the lions,

and then we get a call to say,

"Whatever you do, be careful as you're going around there,

"a tree's come down across the road and they can't get to the lions."

So it was like, "OK, excellent. Now what are we going to do?"

We were wandering around, probably 100 yards of the lion enclosure,

we didn't know whether they were in or out.

The lions, as a group, they are extremely dangerous.

The lions that we've got now,

they're pussycats compared to what we had in the past.

We had a male lion, by the name of Zem, and he absolutely hated people

and you could just see it in his eyes

that he would relish the chance of making a meal of anybody.

Obviously, if he was out, then nobody was safe, really.

But, thankfully, when we heard that call to say,

"No, it's OK, they're all indoors," it was a moment to remember, I think!

That night, 200 trees were blown down in the park.

Dozens of enclosures were damaged but, thankfully, no animals escaped.

The whole area was what you would expect if a bomb went off somewhere.

You couldn't get anywhere by vehicle,

there was a huge amount of trees down and they weren't just small trees.

It's the only time in the park's history that we've actually had

to shut down for any significant length of time.

Luckily that, apparently, only happens once every 100 or 200 years,

that we get hit by a hurricane. Thank goodness for that.

But the odd tree can come down at any time,

and so that's one of the main reasons why we do this cat check.

This morning, Chris has almost finished today's cat check,

and all the trees and the carnivores are just where they should be.

I wasn't actually here then, I was only seven years old,

but there's been a lot of tales that came from that night and,

obviously, it was just devastation.

That just gives us an idea of how important doing this is,

because it only takes one tree to come down

and we could have animals out.

This is really, really important for us to do.

Hi, cat check done. Thanks.

Thanks, Chris. We're OK to open, everyone.

Cat check's done, we're free to open up the park now.

Another day starts.

And now we've got to get on with things!

# It's a beautiful day

# Sky falls, you feel like It's a beautiful day

# Don't let it get away

# You're on the road... #

Johny, I always get a bit sad when it's the end of the show.

And then I think, "There's Chris! I'm going to be all happy now!"

These are the Grant's zebras. Is it true we're going to be giving them

an afternoon snack now?

-Yeah, just some bread. If you guys want to throw some out.

-Yay!

I better watch my aim, I don't want to hit any of them.

Why bread, Chris? Is this their favourite food?

It might be their favourite food,

but because they eat so much grass, this is just a little treat for them.

How much bread are they getting through a day?

-We tend to give them maybe a loaf each a day, maybe.

-No way!

-They eat a loaf of bread a day?

-Easily. They could eat more

but it's a treat, so we don't feed it to them all the time.

It's only a little loaf for them, which is nothing to these guys.

What do they eat in the wild?

80% grass, really. Cos they're grazers and they live on the plains,

but they will eat fallen fruits or any other vegetation,

-but it's just pretty boring grass.

-That's their treat, then, the fruit?

Yeah, if they find fruit as they're grazing, they might eat that.

They're fairly happy with just grass.

It's been absolutely amazing to get this close to them.

Thank you so much, Chris. That's all we've got time for today,

but check out what's on the next episode of Roar.

To catch three wild dogs, the vet and the keeper

must go inside their enclosure, and that's a dangerous move

because these guys are absolutely deadly.

Our Roar Rangers love the lemurs.

The lemurs might come up. It's OK.

But are they brave enough for a close encounter?

And Quinto, the new male rhino, was getting on great with the girls -

and then he attacked them! So what went wrong?

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