Wild devotion behind our struggling safaris

As nearly half our zoos face 'financial challenges', despite their popularity, CHRIS RICHES spends a day at a bustling safari park to witness the care and dedication that keeps the show going

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RHINO mud-bath, a tapir tummy rub and hiding a bear’s coconuts — all in a day’s work for an animal keeper at a top safari park.

Research by the British and Irish Association of Zoos and Aquariums found that 40% of the attractions face financial challenges despite their huge popularity. So I have been invited to spend the day helping out at Knowsley Safari in Merseyside, to see the dedication that keeps a zoo or safari park running.

“You can start moving that hay,” says senior ungulates (hoofed mammals) keeper Louise McKinnon. “The rhinos freshly wee’d over it last night.”

The icy rain is driving across the site’s 550 acres this Monday morning as I stand in my wellies and green staff fleece facing a mound of brown, moist hay.

The culprits — southern white rhino mother Bayami, nine, and her three-month-old daughter Kamari - are frolicking inside, clearly not fancying the weather.

The birth of Kamari, whose name means moonlight in Swahili, was important for the conservation of this near-threatened species.

Every birth is a vital contribution to the effort to protect these incredible animals — the global population is around 17,000.

Hay sorted, it is time to shovel some rhino doo-doo. And these two rhinos do do a lot of number twos. “Keep going,” chirps giggling Louise at her hapless new intern. “The more you shovel, the less I have to!”

Louise has 10 southern white rhinos to care for, and visitors on the Safari Drive can see them walk right up to their cars.

By now Bayami and Kamari are eager for some spa treatment.