Episode 6 Animal Park

Today we've got big plans for Monkey Jungle.

A way of keeping the monkeys happy, busy and off the cars.

It's a fun food source and a puzzle all wrapped up into one.

Join us to find out what the monkeys make of their new treat.

We've got a lot more than just monkey business

on today's Animal Park.

There's the little kid goat,

who was rejected by her mother just hours old.

Now it'll be a miracle if she survives.

We're up with the giraffes

to see the other part of their body that's very long.

And I'll be calling on Nico the gorilla.

To see if there's life in the old dog yet.

Don't you even think about pinching my bum.

But first we're going to Monkey Jungle,

a very perilous place for cars.

Of all the species in the park,

the troop of over 70 Rhesus Macaque monkeys

must be the most inquisitive.

You could also call them cheeky, even mischievous.

Or possibly something un-transmittable.

So, while he's patrolling Monkey Jungle,

keeper Ross Ellis has to stay on this toes.

The monkeys are probably the most active animals in the safari park.

So, we've always got to look for ideas to keep them occupied.

Otherwise they'll just keep ripping cars apart.

Anything that can keep them occupied,

keep them stimulated, is a plus.

Windscreen wipers is a popular one.

We get them come off all the time.

As you see here, there's a monkey on top of that one there,

after an aerial.

One on a wing mirror here.

Just checking it out.

The monkeys are always ripping stuff off,

we're forever picking bits up. Here's a bit.

A Ford Mondeo.

This lot has taken Ross only about a day to collect.

So, you see the monkeys really are right little vandals.

The only way to curb their wicked ways is to distract them.

And deputy head warden, Ian Turner,

is always trying to come up with new things to keep them busy.

The plan we want to do is to enrich the monkey's lives.

There's 70 to 80 monkeys there plus babies.

They're always playing on trees and stuff.

So, I'm hoping that if I can get a nice couple of good logs,

for them to play on, it's really gonna be good for 'em.

They need something to keep 'em active.

So, I'm hoping that's what's gonna happen with these logs.

The other idea I've had is to drill holes so we can put food inside.

What we can do is put the mix in there in the mornings,

which should stop seagulls from pinching it.

In the afternoon we can put fruit in there.

Once we've found the logs, it should be no trouble getting them in here,

just a matter of digging a hole and putting two logs in, should be easy.

There are over a million trees on the Longleat Estate

managed by the Forestry Department.

Their yard is piled up with likely logs and tree trunks.

Right then, Ross. These are two I picked out, look.

Oh, yeah.

Slightly different to your normal logs, look.

-Yeah.

-And the other thing I was gonna do is drill some holes in.

-Yeah, I see.

-So literally you can put food in.

-All right.

-You know, bit of apple, orange or mixed food.

Whatever, yeah.

They can sit there, help themselves in all different areas.

It's perfect. It's pretty good.

And we'll do both of them. Got another one here. Got both in.

We'll probably bury them

that deep into the ground.

So you've got six to seven feet out.

-That's cool, then.

-Yeah.

What we need know is to get John up

with his big digger and put them on there.

It's supposed to be soft wood.

So, hopefully the drillings not gonna be too hard,

and they're not too heavy.

So, soon the monkeys will have something to distract them

from their delinquent behaviour.

Ian reckons building it is going to be a very straightforward job.

After all, what could possibly go wrong?

I'm out in the East Africa Reserve with head of section Andy Hayton.

Who's come up with a rather interesting plan.

Andy, what are we up to today?

This is just a bit of environment enrichment

that we've been playing around with.

But we're going to rig up a camera for you as well.

Just to see how long a giraffe's tongue is and how it actually works.

OK. And that's what this rather unusual contraption here is?

So, talk me through this.

-What's, what's...

-Well, all it is obviously is a water bottle.

We've drilled holes in, put food in the bottom

and the giraffe will actually stick its tongue in there...

So, the tongue is actually going to be able...

I can't even get hand in there.

Oh, absolutely. Their tongue is about 18 inches long.

-Wow.

-And they'll use it

and they'll actually curl it around brows and leaves to pull it off.

So, it's a pretty incredible thing.

Wow. And where are we going to put this?

We'll put it a way up there.

Yeah. Well, knowing your giraffes here I've brought my own little treat

to add to your cocktail which I know are simply irresistible.

-Spoiling them.

-We'll put a few bananas in.

I think that's probably enough. How are we going to get this up?

-What I'll do is I'll jump off the trunk, Ben.

-OK.

-I'll lower this hook down with this winch.

-Right.

-And then I can raise it right back up for you.

-Perfect.

-Well, I'll wait here and let you do...

-That's fine.

OK. So, we're going to put that on.

Bev helping out there.

So, how high are you going to take this, this water bottle, now?

I'm not sure how tall this one is.

It must be about 12 foot.

-Right.

-Off the ground.

So, it'll only the bigger giraffe that can get this out here.

This bottle.

Oh, that must be high enough, surely? You're making it so hard for them.

Oh, yeah, we don't wanna make life too easy.

That really is, that's only for the very tallest giraffes here.

Yeah. Well, what we normally do

is this will actually go inside the house at night,

-to keep them occupied in the evenings.

-Right.

-And a camel.

-And we've got camels coming in,

they're certainly not going to reach it?

Absolutely not. OK, Bev, you wanna pull forwards?

We're gonna move away a little bit now

and hopefully let the giraffes come in.

Are they sensitive about humans being around?

Not too bad. They're used to us. OK, Bev, lovely.

They're used to us being around.

So, hopefully we're actually going to see their tongues

literally go in those holes and hoick out various bits of carrot

and look, here we go.

-Look, look, here we go.

-There you go.

-So, we're got a tongue going in.

Is it actually... Oh! It was a piece of my banana that went in there.

-The banana's winning.

-That is fantastic.

So, their tongues...remind me how long they can be?

About 18 inches long.

They're huge, they can grip with their tongues as well.

-So, they're using them almost like fingers, are they?

-Essentially, yeah.

But you'll also notice as well, if we get a good look at it,

-the tongue's black.

-Right.

-So it avoids sunburn.

Because it spends so much time out of their mouth in hot African sun.

There you go. You can actually see it's like a bluey-black colour.

Isn't that amazing?

And look, there it goes. Is it, it might sound like a silly question,

is it kind of sticky or almost like sandpaper, I imagine.

Yeah, it's roughish. A lot of saliva as well to help with digestion.

Because they eat, the acacia that they'll eat in the wild,

thorns are probably three, four inches long.

Really? And they're able to get their tongues,

eat everything around those thorns?

That's right. Pull it off very carefully. We'll give them Hawthorne

occasionally here cos that's got quite big spikes.

And that mimics the nearest you're gonna get to acacia?

They treat that with a lot of respect when they eat it. That's it.

-Quite slowly.

-That's incredible. Did you think they'd go for it

-as well as they have?

-I knew Imogene would.

-Oh, did you?

-Imogene is definitely led by her stomach

more than her brain, for sure.

Andy, they're really struggling for it, but that's the point.

You don't wanna make it easy for them, do you?

That's the whole point.

If we made life easy and just put food out on a plate for them

and they never had to work to get it they would be bored.

And a bored animal is not a happy animal.

We have to keep them as motivated as we possibly can.

Look at that. That is great.

Well, Andy, thank you very much for letting me help you out.

I think these giraffes are going to be occupied for quite some time.

Last winter, and for the second year in a row,

John Joe, the champion pygmy goat,

had a busy fortnight up in the East African Reserve.

The Longleat herd is predominantly female

and they don't have their own Billy.

That's why John Joe came hot foot from his home in the Welsh valleys.

He is a jobbing stud and he soon got down to business.

But that was five months ago and now senior warden, Bev Evans,

has some predictable, though still exciting, news.

Well, currently our five female goats are heavily pregnant.

Due this week and it's their second time.

We had births last year.

And hopefully our, our five girls will be very successful this year

and we should have quite a few kids hopefully.

This is Sour and Sour's one of our friendliest goats

and probably noisiest, actually.

And she did incredibly well last year. She had our, our twins.

So, hopefully she'll do just as well this year.

Our girls are looking incredibly big.

I would say, but obviously I can't say for certain,

but a lot of them are carrying twins. They are that big.

They're very round, also their udders are beginning to drop

which shows a sign that they are very imminent.

We're just keeping an eye on them at the moment.

And well they might.

Because Bev and the team remember only too well

what happened last year.

For most of the herd,

it was the first time they had ever been pregnant.

And when they began to give birth, things started to go wrong.

Sour did all right but most of the other nannies' kids were stillborn.

Lily had the worst time of all.

She was in such distress that the vet, Duncan Williams,

had to be called to carry out an emergency Caesarean.

Bev was there along with head of section, Andy Hayton.

For the sake of the babies,

the operation was done just under a local anaesthetic.

OK, just feeling in there for the uterus.

Grab the inside of the uterus.

It took just moments to get the first kid out.

There were no signs of life.

Swinging the baby is to clear fluid from the lungs.

Massaging is to try and get their system going.

In fact, there were two.

Lily was carrying twins.

But there was never any hope.

By the time he started to do the stitches,

Duncan had discovered what happened.

Unfortunately the placenta was detached already.

So, the kids had died in the uterus

probably some time during the night.

At least Lily did make a full recovery.

But when birthing time was over,

the final count for the whole herd was pretty grim.

Out of nine kids carried to term, there was just three still alive.

So, of course, this year right now tensions are running high.

As Bev settles them in for the night,

it's anyone's guess what she'll find tomorrow morning.

And who will be the first?

If I had to put my money on it, I'd either go for Sour or for Prawn.

They're looking like their stomachs are starting to change shape.

Their back end's very puffy.

Their udders are down.

Also they sometimes start bleating, not to me but to themselves,

and that's a sign that, you know,

there's possible movement and the kids are about to come.

So, yes, we'll just have to wait and see.

We'll be back later, when the very first babies arrive.

And let's just hope that this year goes a little better than last.

Two gorillas used to live on the island in Half Mile Lake,

Nico, the silver back male and Samba, his mate.

They were both 46 years old, which is a very great age for a gorilla.

And they'd spent almost their entire lives together.

But three months ago Samba passed away.

The keepers were all pretty upset.

After all, she was a big part of their lives.

But perhaps the blow fell hardest on Nico.

And since Samba died, everyone's been putting a lot of effort

in getting him through this difficult time.

Well, I've come up to Gorilla Island to meet head of section, Mark Tye,

and to see how Nico is getting on. Morning, Mark.

-Morning, Kate.

-How are you?

-I'm fine.

-Good. Wow, he's actually looking better than I thought.

-He is.

He's amazingly doing really well.

-I was so worried as to how he'd cope.

-I bet you were.

And initially, obviously, it was very distressing for him and us.

And slowly but surely he's really picked himself up and has,

-kind of, changed into a much lighter individual, if you like.

-Oh, really?

Really? So, you've actually noticed changes in his character?

Definitely. You know, as you know,

he had his stroppy tendencies every now and again.

-Absolutely!

-He seems much calmer now.

-Yeah.

Much more relaxed. He doesn't eat all his food in five seconds flat.

He actually takes time over it.

He uses the island a lot more.

Spends a lot more time foraging, which he never used to do.

He used to leave that for Samba.

Let Samba do all the work and he'd just sit and eat, wouldn't he?

Yes, he'd go for all the easy pickings.

And how about... I mean, you and Michelle

have both worked with him for a very long time.

Particularly you. Have you noticed his, sort of, relationship,

for want of a better word, changing towards you two as well?

Um, he's... He went right off us, initially.

-Really?

-After she'd died.

He was very angry with us all.

Almost as if he thought we'd done something to her.

And it took a long time, it took a good few months

for him to, sort of, come back and start being nice again.

Particularly with me,

he's become much more relaxed and much more vocal again.

So, what's the plan for today?

Well, the girls particularly, have come up with lots of new ideas

for keeping him occupied while he's outside.

Don't you even think about pinching my bum.

He still has to have a cheeky, a cheeky go, doesn't he?

He does. He hasn't lost his spirit completely.

The girls particularly have come up with a lot of ideas

for giving him more to do while he's outside,

-and also inside in the house.

-Yeah.

-And one of them is this novel lump of wood with some holes in.

-OK.

And what they've been doing is filling the holes with all sorts of different flavoured things.

Chocolate spread, peanut butter, honey.

Put them down in the holes and he dips his finger in.

So, this is sort of like the gorilla equivalent of doing the crosswords

-every afternoon, or something?

-Yup.

-Keeping his brain active.

-Yes, yes.

Brilliant. Well, shall we start?

I'm gonna give you the chocolate spread

-cos I think that stuff's evil.

-Right.

And I'll try the honey.

Now, this doesn't look like the most low calories of snacks.

No, this is, this is not something we give him on a regular basis.

Right. So, it's a kind a treat?

A treat thing, yeah, really.

Some of the other ideas we've come up with,

we have a small cage feeder which we put all his fruit and vegetables in,

-in oversize pieces.

-Right.

That he has to push out with his fingers.

Which again takes a long time for him to do.

But this is a bit of fun for him and a nice, nice flavours.

-Nice flavours.

-I quite like the chocolate myself.

And does this go into his cage, here?

We can put it in there if we want to.

But we've been putting it outside for him.

-Oh, OK.

-And hanging it from one of the trees out there.

-Shall we go hang this up?

-Yup.

-And see what he makes of it.

-Absolutely.

-All right. Shall I, shall I grab it?

-It's a bit hefty.

-Weighs a ton.

Hold on, mate, we're going to send you a treat out.

So, you're going to hang this up, are you?

Yup, we'll hang it up over here. Off this tree.

Brilliant.

OK.

Just put it down here a minute. Let's take these shackles out.

Well, I guess what we need to do now is let Nico out,

and see if he likes it.

So, join us a little bit later to find out whether Nico goes for

peanut butter, honey or yucky chocolate spread.

-No way is he going to go for the chocolate spread.

-He will.

Keeper Ross Ellis and deputy head warden Ian Turner

have come up with a similar plan to enrich feeding time

for their troop of Rhesus Macaque monkeys.

The hope is the more time they spend eating,

the less time they'll have to vandalise the visitor's cars.

They've found a couple of tree trunks in the Forestry yard.

And the idea is to turn them into a kind of climbing frame cafe.

But first they have to moved.

So, Ian's called in the professionals.

Here's Mike Worley and his heavy mover.

-Ian.

-All right?

Little job for you, look.

Yeah, little.

According to Tommy, they're not very heavy.

It won't be that big a job, as long as we can lift them up,

but they shouldn't be that heavy cos they're soft wood. So, simple.

Mike's machine clears the small logs out of the way like matchwood.

After all, this baby can shift up to one and a half tons no problem.

Now, for the main mission.

To pick up Ian's tree trunks, carry them up the yard,

and then put them on to the back of a flat bed lorry.

I'm hoping it weighs about a ton and a half, which is what he can lift.

If it's more than that, we'll have to think of a different machine.

It's tricky to get a grip but when he does, there's a problem.

Mike's machine must admit defeat.

-Too heavy?

-Too heavy, yeah.

I suspect it's three ton there.

It's amazing, isn't it? What you think it is.

And that's the hollow one. We're gonna have to go to Plan B now.

It was too big for the JCB.

So, what we'll do is get a Telehandler in now.

Hopefully we don't have to go to Plan C.

This is the Telehandler.

When it comes to heavy loads, it's a real monster.

Capable of lifting up to three tons.

But even the Telehandler can't handle it!

So, now the two machines are going to have a go together.

Come to keep an eye on his heavy metal

is plant hire supremo John Miles.

And even the grounds and gardens manager is here, Tommy Parker.

But, despite their combined efforts,

and the fact that half the estate now seems to be involved,

the logs still aren't shifting.

Meanwhile, back in Monkey Jungle,

the little delinquents are getting restless.

Bored with the cars,

they've started on the buffalo.

Never easy now. Plan C.

-When we get to...

-D, E...

-Yeah!

When we get to 26 in the alphabet we're in trouble.

If the trunk's just too heavy,

the only thing to do is to chop a chunk off.

It's a bit of a disappointment that we're going to lose a bit of tree.

But, you've still got another ten foot of it.

It's funny, you look at a tree and think, "I'll just get a tree up,

"pick it up, shove it in the Monkey Jungle, monkey's will be happy,"

turns out it weighs three and half, four ton.

Or it did. Now it's a little lighter.

So, much to Ian's relief,

the truncated trunk can finally be lifted onto the lorry.

The hardest part we thought was gonna be drilling the holes.

So, I'm hoping that's going to be the easy part.

Right. Well, 50% done.

That's one on the lorry. They're just gonna finish off this one.

I'll go and unload this one and then we'll come back for that one. Fine?

If Ian reckons his troubles are over, he could be in for a surprise.

We'll be back later to see

if the monkeys ever do get their fantastic new climbing frame cafe.

Earlier I joined head of section Mark Tye on Gorilla Island,

preparing a special treat for Nico.

Now, Mark, it's hanging up ready.

The, sort of, bit of wood with all those little sticky treats in.

So, now's the big test time. Is he gonna like it?

I'm sure he'll like it but whether he'll go to it straight away,

cos obviously it's something new, he might not notice it there.

He might just disappear round the other side of the house.

OK. So, shall we see what happens?

Yeah, OK. Michelle, do you want to let him out, please? Thank you.

Now quite often he comes bolting out of this door. Does he still do that?

Sometimes, yeah.

See how he behaves today.

-Here he is.

-Oh, here he is.

-All right?

-He's looking magnificent, Mark.

I mean, he's looking, he's looking very healthy.

Because he had all those health problems last year.

And he did begin to look...

-well, really quite old man-ish, didn't he?

-Yes, yes.

But he's looking great. Look at him.

He is. He's looking in fantastic shape.

-And he's spotted that straight away.

-He has, straight away.

Not quite sure whether to go straight for it.

It's amazing, when you see him standing in that posture,

you see that kind of classic bent back forearms,

or the bent, sort of, forward forearms.

And that power.

Yeah. He's got immense power.

He's very strong.

But you know luckily for us he's become quite...ha!

-Look at that.

-Chocolate.

-I think he's gone straight...

-No, that looked like peanut putter to me.

-Are you sure?

I think he went for the peanut butter. That's great.

Oh, look at him. He looks so content. That's brilliant.

And that's quite good cos that'll last quite a long time, you know?

And he'll spend a lot of time messing about with it.

Then he'll probably get bored, walk off,

do something different and come back to it.

Then come back and play around with it. Now, he's an old gorilla.

-He's mid-40's now.

-47.

47? Wow.

But he's always had quite a lot of grey hair.

The grey hair isn't just age, is it?

No. The majority of that is the silver...

what's known as the silverback. Which is a mature adult male.

-And they get that through being a sign of dominance.

-Right.

Obviously because there's no other males around, he's top dog.

-He got it.

-He got the silverback. But there is an awful lot,

particularly if you notice in his arms,

that is just old age grey hair.

-Oh, is it?

-Yes.

-So the arms would normally be black?

-A lot darker, yeah.

-Yeah, yeah.

They are incredibly powerful animals.

They are incredibly powerful, yeah.

Since Samba's gone he's just become much more relaxed, I think.

Much more chilled out, much more of a gentleman.

Well, if, if that's a good thing to come out of the departing of Samba

then that is, that's, that's great.

-Yeah.

-I mean, he seems...as I say,

I was really worried about seeing him today. And he, he does seem...

He seems, sort of, content and happy.

And, and as you say, quite chilled out.

Quite relaxed with his lot.

He is, and it's pleasing for us that that's the way it's gone, you know.

-Absolutely.

-It could have been a lot worse.

And, you know, he's taken to living on his own quite well.

And we do our best to pamper him in every way we can.

And obviously he's still got his television that he loves to bits.

Well, Mark, thank you very, very much and keep up the good work.

-Keep him happy.

-Thank you.

Cos he's very special, I know you think so too.

And he's still definitely going for the peanut butter over there.

Chocolate!

Back up in the goat house, there's been some exciting news.

Early this morning, the nanny called Sour

gave birth to three little kids.

But there's a problem, pygmy goats have only two teats.

Which makes it hard for them to care for three babies.

So, the mother will often reject and abandon one of them.

Already it looks like Sour has decided

to just ignore the smallest kid.

It may seem hard but it is the natural way.

Bev Evans, who looks after the goats,

is giving Sour one last chance to recognise her most needy baby.

Sadly she just doesn't want to know.

So, now it's up to Bev to try to save its life.

She's brought the kid into the staff room where it's warmer.

Of course, nobody ever wants to take a baby from its mother.

But this is a matter of life and death.

The kid is a little girl and her body temperature is dangerously low.

We're just taking over Sour's job.

Stimulate her, get her cleaned up, get her dry.

And we're just trying to...

see how she's gonna do, really.

It's been a little bit touch and go.

It's hard to say if she's going to survive or not.

She won't survive long without milk.

And the best place to get that is from Mum.

So, head of section, Andy Hayton,

is trying to get some from Sour.

So, this will give the baby the best head start

it can possibly wish for.

You're a star. Lovely.

Let's try a little bit more into you.

This special first milk is called colostrum.

It's full of antibodies to help protect newborn babies

from disease and infection,

in the first few days of their precarious lives.

But if she's to survive, she'll need a lot more milk than this.

She swallowed there.

-Swallowed, did she?

-Yeah, just some.

She's too weak to take any more milk right now.

In fact, she doesn't look too good.

Sour's only had twins before.

She never had triplets.

So, she's probably quite occupied with giving birth to the second one

and then the third, and by that time this little one had got a bit cold

and wasn't bleating as much and wasn't really standing as much.

So, you know, once the other two were up and about,

Sour's attention kind of turned to them.

Maybe she knows something that we don't.

Maybe she thinks this little one's a bit of a lost cause.

But we can't really tell that until later on, really.

Is that better?

She's perked up a little bit

and then she's gone a little bit sleepy again, you know.

We'll just keep carrying on with this,

just trying to give her just a bit more energy really.

As I said, she's still very weak.

Clearly she's fading fast.

Maybe we'll give her a bit more of that kick start in a minute.

Is she taking it?

As a last resort, Andy is trying an emergency treatment.

A kind of pick me up medicine that's used by farmers on struggling newborn lambs.

It's like a vitamin mineral type supplement type thing

and it just gives them a real boost.

It's kind of kill or cure almost.

But it's not looking good.

She's not as perky as she was.

Sometimes they just quit.

It's what happens.

She's not, she's not gone yet.

She's not gone yet, no.

But Andy and Bev know there's really not much hope

and it may only be a matter of time.

Later on we'll find out what happens to the poor little kid.

I'm out in the new area with keeper Adrian Lanfear

and some of his Bactrian camels.

Now, Adrian, I heard a fascinating fact that there aren't actually

very many wild Bactrian's left in the world.

No. There's only about 1000 left wild in the world now.

Most of them are domesticated.

Around about two million.

So, basically there's two million Bactrian camels in the world.

But only 1,000 of those live wild.

-All the rest have kind of been harnessed by man.

-Yes, that's right.

Isn't that incredible? So, what do we use camels for?

Well, obviously they have many uses in the desert.

To carry goods across the desert.

Their fur can be used for coats and lining tents.

And also they use the milk.

It's the only form of nourishment for the camel herder.

-Wow. Have you ever tried camel milk?

-I haven't myself.

You haven't. Something tells me it might be a bit rich.

No. I'm quite happy buying mine from the supermarket.

Adrian, thank you very much.

Here's what's still to come on today's programme.

We'll find out if the tiny kid goat pulls through.

Helping out in the snake house, Kate gets three pythons to cuddle.

Rather her than me.

And shipwreck and catastrophe are only a whisker away

when Ben takes control of one of the big boats.

Hard over to me in forward gear. Forward gear. You're out of gear!

Don't have it out of gear. Because otherwise you're gonna go...

now try and keep it straight. Don't panic.

But now we're going to catch up

with deputy head warden Ian Turner and keeper Ross Ellis.

They've finally managed to get their tree trunks moved.

But they've still got a lot to do

before the monkeys can get their paws on them.

Right, tree's here.

-Finally.

-I don't know whether it's going to be hard to drill

or not hard to drill. But after the morning we've had,

It can't get any worse, I would have thought, than it has.

In the wild, Rhesus Macaque monkeys spend most of their days foraging

for fruit or hunting for bugs.

In order to make feeding more interesting here at Longleat,

the plan is to drill holes all over the trunks

and stuff their food inside.

Fishing it out should keep the monkeys busy for ages.

All right, Ross, what do you reckon? Is that deep enough, you reckon?

Yeah, she seems deep enough.

It's not the adults so much, it's the young ones.

We don't it so deep that they can't get all the way in.

-Do you know what I mean?

-Yeah.

-Because it's the young ones.

Because the adults it wouldn't matter so much. But the young ones.

-I'd say that's about right, isn't it?

-Yeah.

-Well, I can't feel the bottom. Cool. One down.

-20 odd to go.

With so many holes to drill,

Ross and Ian are going to be here for quite a while.

The next morning, everything's ready for the trunks to be put in place.

Ian's picked the spot.

The main reason why we're doing the holes here

is we've done a lot of work on the other side.

So, we thought for a change we'd do something over this side.

We've done it in this position so it's in the sun.

So they've got plenty of sunshine to go in.

We're doing it in two different places,

so it's not all in one place.

They've got a bit of interaction between the two logs.

I may even put a log on top of the two, to do a bit in between.

But it's going quite good, after yesterday's disaster.

Driving the digger is heavy metal supremo John Miles.

He and Ian both have a good idea of how deep the hole should be.

Unfortunately, it's not the same idea.

How deep do you reckon that is, four foot?

It's twice as deep as half way.

Yeah.

Trust me, I'm a digger driver.

THEY LAUGH

Ha!

Yeah. That way, then that way.

So, the trunk is finally upright but Ian's still not happy.

-What do you reckon?

-Well, in an ideal world I'd like it to be...

-I'd like a little bit round that way.

-Yeah?

-If possible.

-What, just tweak it round that way?

-Yeah.

So visitors, when they come down, have the view from this bit.

Whereas here there's quite a few of them dotted round there.

If you could just hold that side, Mike.

You push it that way and I'll pull it that way, yeah?

That's straight.

I'm really, really pleased how it's looking.

I reckon if you have the other a bit further down.

And maybe a big log in between, it'll look really good.

Yeah. So, this has worked out really well. Really pleased with it.

Ian may be delighted

but it's up to the monkeys to pass the final verdict.

We'll be back in Monkey Jungle at feeding time.

To see if they also think their new trunks are tree-mendous.

I'm down by Half Mile Lake

with Kim Tucker from Pet's Corner who's put me to work.

-This not easy, Kim.

-No.

-I can see why you gave me the fork!

-It's quite stony. So, I'm digging up these plants here.

-Yup.

-What for?

-For the Royal Python tank back in Pet's Corner.

-Really?

-Yeah.

-But pythons don't eat grass, do they?

No, they don't. They use it for lots of other different reasons.

Things like hiding and it can help with the shedding of their skin,

-give them different things to rub through.

-Oh, OK.

So, they would literally sort of coil their way through it.

And any dead skin that they had hanging off would be pulled off?

It would help. This and the rocks and everything that we put in there.

There's also enrichment. To give them something else. Different smells.

OK. So, you said you want a few bigger ones?

Yup. There's a few back further up that way.

OK. Stick that in there. Right, I'll carry the fork.

You can do the barrow since you've been standing there doing nothing!

-So, I gather that pythons are the thing that you love the most?

-Yes.

I find them very therapeutic. It's quite nice to sit there with a python

and let it move through your hands. They're not quick.

They're very slow and very patient. Just, just lovely, lovely creatures.

I do quite enjoy being around them, I must say.

-So, these are the bigger ones that you want here?

-Perfect, yup.

-OK. So, what, dig up a whole plant like that?

-Yeah.

If we can get some quite big clumps.

-OK.

-Because there's quite a lot of space in the tank.

All right. Well, I'm going to carry on doing this with Kim...

if I don't break the fork, which I think I might have just done.

And we will join you up in Pet's Corner in just a little bit.

To see how much the pythons appreciate their grass.

Back up in the staff room,

it's been an hour since the newborn kid was brought inside.

She had to be rescued after being rejected by her mother,

the nanny goat called Sour.

Bev Evans is trying to keep the baby alive with body massage

and tiny feeds of mother's milk.

But clearly the kid's life is hanging in the balance.

Right now, Bev's desperately trying to keep the baby warm.

Brought in a hot water bottle

just to try and warm it up from all angles, really.

And starting to perk up a little bit.

Starting to lift its head but only in like fits and starts.

It's not really... jumping for joy yet.

The kid was rejected because Sour must have felt

she couldn't look after three babies at once.

But now head of section Andy Hayton has spotted a problem

with one of the other kids.

So, he's called in vet Paul Higgs to take a look.

Five hours after being born, one of them still can't stand up properly.

No, there was no strength in it whatsoever.

Whenever he was putting weight on it,

his back legs were just both splaying completely.

He's quite weak, isn't he? I think his main problem

is that his toes aren't... If you put his toes flat,

he can't actually stand on the bottoms of his feet at the moment.

Because he's tendons are all contracted down.

The problem was caused by having three babies in the womb.

They were squashed together with no room to stretch.

So, the tendons in his back legs haven't developed properly.

Generally they come right within 24 hours, you know.

Otherwise we could...

if he's still not right sort of tomorrow afternoon or whenever...

then we can stick a splint on them. That's the other thing.

But considering it's both of them,

we don't really want to be splinting both his legs.

And usually they just come right all by themselves.

And in terms of her, I mean,

she looks fantastic for having just given birth to three.

So...I think they'll do fine.

While the vet's been in the barn,

Bev's been waiting in the staff room with the poor little kid.

She was fading away but now there's been a minor miracle.

About an hour ago she was still wrapped up in a towel,

hardly lifting her head and then just took the towel off her.

And she just stood straight up, had a wee

and she's been like this ever since. Just won't even sit down.

Yeah.

With little young ones, like lambs and kids,

when they've got very little energy when they come out,

very little reserves.

So, if they get cold they rapidly use those up, you know.

Once they've warmed up, they tend to come back to life quite quickly.

She's, she's quite good. If you stick your finger in her mouth,

she sucks really nice and strong now.

So, she should be quite happy to go onto the bottle now.

Rather than just squirting it into her mouth.

And she's got loads of energy.

She looks as good as the other two now, doesn't she, really?

Yeah, she does, yeah. Bless her.

It's turned out pretty well, as you can see.

Bit of a shock actually taking off the towel

and she just stood straight up.

So, from nearly death's door to up and about and quite lively.

Yeah, really pleased.

Long day but yeah, very good day in the end.

So far so good. But now Bev and Andy will have to raise her by hand,

bottle feeding her day and night.

And with four other pregnant nannies due to give birth any day now,

they could be in for a very busy time.

Amongst his many adventures and courageous exploits,

you may remember that our Ben once rode across the Atlantic,

along with Olympic oarsman James Cracknell.

For someone to take on such a serious piece of water

in such a tiny craft, they'd have to be pretty keen on boating.

So, when Ben heard that Longleat has got two new tour boats,

we couldn't keep him away.

Though this time he has agreed to keep his clothes on.

I love messing around in boats.

And today there's a real treat in store for me.

Because I'm going to learn to drive a boat in a lake filled with hippos,

sea lions and an island with gorillas.

Now, up here, is head of boats... morning, Bill.

-Hello, Ben. Nice to see you.

-How are you?

-Fine.

You're going to teach me how to drive the Lady Lenka.

This is one of the new boats on Half Mile Lake, isn't it?

I'm going to do my best. I know you've ridden row boats

-but I'm not sure how you are with power boats.

-Very different sort.

I am itching to get on the water.

-Shall we?

-OK.

-What's the first thing to do?

-I'd like to show you the controls of the boat for a start.

-OK.

Up for forward, down for reverse, wheel for port and starboard.

Throttle for however many revs you want.

-We're waiting to cast away?

-Yup. He released the back strap.

When I'm clear of the other bit, I'm going to pass this over to you, Ben.

Now, we're clear of everything. Do you want to take over?

-If you trust me.

-I do.

-Right.

Obviously just want to avoid this island. But this is where Nico lives.

Yeah, Nico's on here. Try and keep it straight.

Push the throttle down to just give it a bit more power.

No, keep it down. Don't take it off. No, you've taken all the revs off.

-We've got no power at all.

-I'm not doing well, am I?

-You're doing OK.

Watch your back, you've got to keep at least 30 feet from the island.

There's so many things to think about! I've got the radio going,

-I'm worried about... Oh, is that OK? Is it still turning?

-Yeah.

Cos I want to turn the other way.

The boat goes in the direction you turn the wheel,

whether it's going forward or backward.

There's so much to think about!

Now, next thing is you've got Jo-Jo standing up on the tree there.

That's a... we call it a tree lion at Longleat.

-A tree lion!

-Now I want you concentrate a bit here.

Here is the tricky part.

With any vessel, the most challenging manoeuvre is landing the boat.

Just take a few revs off. Take it down one notch there.

That's it, lovely.

I imagine this is the hardest part.

Very hard and you don't do anything

other than follow precisely what I tell you, please.

Start your turn as if you're going doing the cut.

Keep turning but keep going in that direction first.

Come further down, otherwise you'll land too high up the key.

Push the revs on it because you're not coming round fast enough.

That's it, watch, watch it. OK?

-Yup, very good.

-That's fine. That's fine.

-This is quite nerve-wrecking.

-Yup.

-More.

-More revs?

-More revs, yeah. Right, take the revs off.

-Put it into reverse now.

-Have I put it into reverse?

Yeah and that has the same affect. Hold it in reverse.

Wheel right over. Now, forward gear.

Hard over to me in forward gear. Forward gear! You're out of gear.

Don't have it out of gear cos otherwise you're going to...

Don't panic! Just go slowly.

-Hard over to you?

-Yeah. Take it out... Yeah. Take the revs off.

Now, right up the key.

ALARM BEEPS

-Oh, you've stopped the engine.

-Oh, dear.

-You took the revs right off.

-I took the revs right off.

Right, keep the wheel hard up to the left.

-Hard to the left.

-And just keep going.

Little bit of forward motion.

Now then, I want you to put the wheel hard over to the left.

Hard over to the left, yeah?

-And put it into reverse.

-Into reverse?

-Just very gently.

That's it. That's it. Hold it.

-Out of gear.

-Out of gear.

That's it, take the revs off.

You've landed the boat.

That's it, leave it like that.

Now, what you've done, you've brought it to the point.

-But when she's tied the boat up, we can open this gate.

-Right.

-And we're right opposite the entrance. Just like that.

-Ta-da!

Now, not everybody can do what you've just done.

They sometimes bang the key, panic.

So, how do you rate me, out of ten?

-Oh, I'd give that a nine out of ten instantly.

-Nine out of ten.

For your first go at landing it.

So, so I could, I could have a job here one day?

-Oh, absolutely. Oh, yeah.

-Fantastic. Bill, thank you very much. Thank you.

There's hope for me yet, even if I do have to wipe my brow.

That was pretty scary.

When Sour the nanny goat gave birth to three kids,

no-one really thought that the tiny weak one was going to survive.

But that didn't stop Bev Evans and Andy Hayton doing all they could.

And now here we are one week later.

And here she is, the comeback kid.

Pretty amazing... comeback of all comebacks,

I think this one, isn't it?

I mean, there was points when we actually thought it was dead.

So, it's nice when things like this happen.

She came home with me on the first night.

And she stayed at my house probably a good five, five or six days.

Because she was just so incredibly weak.

She's special in lots of ways.

She's called Bubble.

Because she sits, after she's had her milk

and blows big bubbles out the side of her mouth.

So, yeah - a special character.

You may have noticed that Bubble isn't the only new kid on the block.

In fact since Sour gave birth,

four of the other nanny goats have also had theirs.

There are baby goats everywhere.

Male, male...male.

Five... Yeah, five males. Four females.

Bubble still needs to be bottle fed

and now she's not the only one Bev's got to take special care of.

I couldn't believe it. Two sets of triplets. Oh, my God!

That was just a shock.

Obviously we've got two which we're hand rearing on the bottle.

As you can see, very healthy and hungry. You know, all together

and all playing around in the sunshine doing really well.

When I was growing up, I just wanted to be working with animals.

I grew up on a farm and I've always wanted,

you know, a job that's outside and involves a lot of animals.

Cuddly, non-cuddly, whatever shape, big or small.

So, hanging around with goats which are coming out of your ears...

yeah, it's brilliant. Very nice.

At the moment they're not staying in this paddock.

We move them up to the top goat barn at night.

Just because it's warmer and cosier.

And that in itself is a feat.

Organising four mums and many babies is certainly a feat to be seen.

The pygmy goats may be smaller than most of the other residents

of the East African Reserve,

but at round-up time they can be a lot more trouble.

Come on, goats!

We'll be checking back on the pygmy goats

and all their kids later in the series.

Earlier I helped Kim Tucker collect a load of grass,

which we have down here, for the pythons.

-And now I suppose it's a question of giving this to them.

-Yep.

-OK.

What we're going to do first is take all the old stuff out

cos it all looks a bit grotty.

-Yup.

-So, they've obviously had good use of it.

-Lovely.

-All right. Well, I've got the muck bucket.

-Lovely job.

Just open up the door.

So, they're not all going to make a dash for it, presumably?

No, no. They shouldn't do. They're not particularly quick.

We've got a few up here. We'll get them out the way first.

-We've got...

-OK. Who's this one?

-That one is Khan.

-Oh, Khan. Now, Khan's the male, isn't he?

-One of the males.

-Yup. These are all the males in here.

-OK.

-So, that one's Kalif.

Do they mind being kind of held in a great big kind of bundle, like this?

Not particularly, no.

As long as they're lovely and warm, they don't really mind.

OK. So, I'll keep them close to me. Hello, guys.

Gosh, they are absolutely beautiful.

This is Sir Hiss. This is our newest one.

-Sir Hiss?

-Yes.

-He's gorgeous.

-He is lovely.

Now, these are relatively small snakes.

Are they... Have they still got some growing to do?

Sir Hiss has. He's quite a small one. Khan's actually fully grown.

-Oh, OK.

-For a male.

The one underneath, that's Kalif. Khan, under here. He's fully grown.

Boy Royal Pythons generally don't get very big.

Sort of maximum of about three or four foot.

The girls have been known to get up to about six foot.

-Really?

-Yup.

-All right. Well, I've got hold of these guys.

Do you want me to hold the bucket?

Just pop that on the floor for the minute.

Don't want to give you too much to do. Dropping everything.

Ha! Arm full of snakes and a bad bucket.

So, we're going to clear all this lot out?

Yup. I don't know if you want to just have a look, just down here.

-If I can just show you... in the grass here.

-Yeah.

Is actually...

Negotiate the pond.

Oh, look at that.

-Amazing.

-So, they've used this one.

So, this just goes to prove...

That they use it.

..That they use it to shed... help shed their skin.

That's incredible. And it's basically because

the skin doesn't grow at the same rate as them. Is that right?

Kind of, yeah. It rejuvenates.

Same way our skin comes off all the time, their's comes off all at once.

When they get injured and stuff like that,

-it takes a long time for reptile skin to heal.

-Right.

So, any reptiles really. Their skin's not very rejuvenative.

OK. I'm going to stick that down.

So, these all need to go in the muck bucket?

-Yup. There's some quite large ones down here.

-Right. Whoops.

There we go. Look, boys, at all this work we're doing for you.

How do you think their new greenery is looking? Shall we see if we...

I will pop a few little bits down here.

OK, shall I put these guys back and see if they approve.

Now, look at you lot. You've got yourselves all tangled up.

I don't know which one's which.

They're absolutely beautiful. There you are, I'll give you this one.

Thank you very much.

And we'll make sure that they enjoy their nice new enclosure.

Kim, thank you very much for letting me help you today.

-No worries.

-And right, you gorgeous boys,

I shall put you back to enjoy your new grass. There you go.

There you are. See what you make of that.

After 36 hours of hard work, deputy head warden Ian Turner

and keeper Ross Ellis's new tree trunk climbing-frame cafe

is finally ready for the hungry monkeys.

It's all finished now. All ready to trial.

It's going to take a little bit of a while to feed this morning.

But the longer we take, it means that the more time

the monkeys have got to take to get it all out.

And normally we just scatter this all over the floor.

And a lot of it goes to birds, which hopefully will cut that out a bit.

But they're very inquisitive. They're already looking, look.

As soon as we walk away they'll be here.

In fact, they'll probably be here before we've finished

at the rate we're going.

They're going to wonder what it is.

As soon as we're gone they'll be over here to check it out.

Hopefully they will enjoy it. Fingers crossed.

Yeah, well, I'm looking forward to seeing it in action.

Obviously we've put a lot of effort into this.

More than we thought we should have!

But it should keep them occupied for a little while at least.

Right. Want to step back and see what happens?

I don't think they're going to be very long.

No, they'll be here straight away.

-Normally is takes about five minutes to eat this, doesn't it?

-Yeah.

Hopefully with this new apparatus, it'll take a bit longer.

Normally, that one there, that'd be finished.

And, look, he's sat perched on there and taking it a bit at a time.

Normally when we do a scatter feed,

the buffalo come in and pinch their food.

This way, hopefully the buffalo won't get so much.

And the monkeys are just literally using them as springboards.

Once the food's gone, the young ones might use this as a play thing.

-Yeah.

-You might find this turns into the juvenile kids corner.

They'll all hang around this side more.

So, was all the effort worth it?

-Considering how much effort it did take.

-Oh, yeah.

To get it all here and get all the work in, I'm pleased.

-Yeah. I'm more than pleased.

-More than pleased.

-Yeah, definitely.

Only time will tell if this is going to keep the monkeys off the cars.

And curb their vandalistic tendencies.

But certainly monkey meal times will never be quite the same again.

They're up there with Romeo and Juliet

or even Scarlet O'Hara and Rhett Butler.

But unlike those star-crossed lovers,

Trevor and Honey are still living their happy ever after ending.

Because after three years together,

it looks like she hasn't lost that loving feeling.

And frankly, my dear, he does give a damn.

Kate and I are out in the East Africa Reserve

with head of section Andy Hayton and Honey the ostrich.

Now, Andy, she's obviously sitting on a nest here, isn't she?

-Yup.

-Any idea how many eggs there are under there?

-There's about 17, 18 eggs under there at the last count.

-Wow.

That sounds like an amazing number.

We have done really well. And it's all down to those two.

They, like a I say, they're just such dedicated parents.

-They're really good.

-Now, Andy, we've got just over here,

Trevor has taken an even more active interest in us.

Is this something to be aware of? We don't want to stress them out.

Yeah. I mean, it's just that dedicated parent thing.

Trev sees us over here.

She's vulnerable at the moment laid there on the nest.

So, Trev's here to protect her and his interests, which are his eggs.

It seems very strange, that she's lying there with her head so flat.

You'd think that she would have her head up

and be looking around for potential predators.

That's an ostrich burying its head in the sand.

-That's where it came from.

-Oh, wow. Of course.

-She makes a low profile.

You see all the long grass, I've cut some of the grass short.

But if she was in the longish grass...

-You wouldn't see her.

-She sits like that, nobody can see her.

She's less vulnerable. It does look like a pile of feathers.

Absolutely, yeah. A good defence mechanism is stay still.

Thanks, Andy. I know you'll keep us up to date with any developments

as they happen. That's all we've got time for on today's programme.

Here's what's coming up on the next Animal Park.

I'll be helping to put up new toys for the lions.

To prove they're just big pussy cats.

We go in search of the world's most dangerous tortoise food.

And there's a life and death drama,

when babies are born on Meerkat Mountain.

So, don't miss the next Animal Park.

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