Rescued tiger finds new home at Noah’s Ark Zoo Farm in Wrexall

Local TV

The zoo has recently unveiled a modernised lion habitat and welcomed a rescued tiger named Aqua. Carefully designed enclosures give the animals space to thrive while highlighting animal conservation.

Transcript

00:00Noah's Ark Zoo Farm has recently opened a completely redesigned lion habitat,

00:06offering climbing mounds, boulders and shaded areas to reflect the lion's natural environment.

00:12A new arrival at the zoo is tiger Aqua, rescued from a trafficking situation in Europe.

00:18The story with Aqua as far as this journey starts with him being found on the border with Belarus

00:26and they rescued him along with another nine tigers that were in appalling conditions,

00:33probably on their way to Chinese medicine and five of those tigers went to live with Ap in Spain

00:39and one of those was Aqua. Aqua is getting on really well, it's difficult to know exactly how

00:45he's going to take a transition and how he's going to settle down because he's not had an ideal life

00:49up until this point, he's been through some quite traumatic experiences so he is taking it in his

00:55own time and we're of course letting him do that and watching him explore.

00:59We've revamped our big cat area specifically for bringing in Aqua now, so we've put loads of

01:06features in that are really great for tigers, we've put lots of planting in so they can choose where

01:11they sit, whether they're on show, whether they're off show and he can get in amongst the forest and

01:15explore that space. He's got different levels he can sit at on various platforms and there's some

01:20feeding poles, a pond because tigers quite like water often, particularly in the summer,

01:24so we've tried to make as many features in there as we could pack in for him to make lots of

01:30choices over and enjoy himself and then he's also in the side of the facility, the building that

01:35we've already got which we've given a little revamp for him as well, so his neighbours are our existing

01:41group of lions around the other end of the building. Across the world tigers and lions face growing

01:46threats, including habitat loss, poaching and illegal trade. Populations have fallen sharply over the last

01:54decade, making conservation initiatives vital. Facilities like Noah's Ark Zoo Farm provide safe, enriched

02:03environments while helping to educate the public and safeguard species.

02:08Yeah, Akwa is an incredible tiger. He had a very troubled past because he was being illegally trafficked

02:15and he was part of a shipment of tigers that were intercepted at the Poland-Velarus border in 2019 and the border

02:24officers opened the back of a horse box and found ten tigers packed into this horse box in terrible

02:30conditions. Sadly one of them had died but the nine remaining tigers were then taken to rehabilitation

02:36centres and Akwa is actually the final tiger to be rehomed and to come here for his brother home.

02:43Yeah, so the habitat we've created especially for Akwa we've really designed with the tiger's needs

02:49in mind and so there's a lot of planting, there's big clumps of bamboo and other trees, we've got mature

02:55trees as well and so there's plenty of cover for him.

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