The Whitley Wildlife Conservation Trust,Paignton Zoo Environmental Park,Living Coasts & Newquay Zoo

Annual Review & Accounts 2013-14

Executive Director’s report

After the spectacular successes of 2013 it was always going to be a hard act to follow and 2014 got off to a shocking start when, for the first three months of the year rain and storms of extraordinary intensity hit the south west of England. The memorable TV images of the shattered railway line at Dawlish, and the inland sea that used to be the Somerset Levels, led to the impression in the rest of the country that Devon and Cornwall were cut off and unreachable, despite the fact that our road connections were completely unaffected. For those of us that earn our living in those counties and rely on visitation from up country, as much as from locals, this was not helpful. Tourism leaders spent much of the rest of the year lobbying to reverse the negative perceptions and to ensure that we continued to receive our share of the UK domestic tourist market.

Overall the total number of visitors to Paignton Zoo fell slightly but the other two sites marginally increased. When translated into finance these numbers led to the organisation achieving the second biggest annual surplus in its history (after 2013) but, partly because of the events noted above, it certainly felt like we had to work a great deal harder to achieve it. The great thing about achieving operating surpluses is that now that we have recovered from the financial losses incurred in 2010-11, and restored our bank balances, any surplus can be immediately invested in delivering on our strategic objectives of Conservation, Education and Advocacy.

We try to be an organisation that bases its operating decisions on evidence, not on guesswork or gut feeling. Sometimes those things can be right and true, but often they aren’t, or are only correct in part. To provide us with evidence as to what visitors, and just as importantly, non-visitors, actually think about us we commissioned research by a company, Brand Vista, using questionnaires, focus groups, and face-to-face interviews. We also invested in tracking software so that we could monitor what visitors actually do, as opposed to what we believed they do, when they visit the Zoos. The results from this research, which surprised and reassured us in equal measure, are still being analysed and absorbed into our plans for coming years.

We are starting to reinvest in the Zoo sites, which is a fancy way of saying that we are building again! At Newquay the new staff facilities and animal kitchen were finally completed and a major risk to our zoo operating licence was thereby

removed. We also completed a large new aviary for macaws and other South American birds that allows them plenty of free-flying space, and helps us to clear the area in the centre of the zoo for the forthcoming Gems of the Jungle exhibit. At Paignton we opened ‘Investigate’, an invertebrate exhibit timed to coincide with the ‘Year of Invertebrates’ theme we had already chosen. At Living Coasts we extended the breeding area for the Macaroni penguins in the hope that we could reduce the competition between pairs for the prime sites. Sadly, avian malaria struck late in the season and three potential breeding pairs were affected by the loss of key birds. Another unexpected death was the breeding male orang-utan at Paignton Zoo, Demo, who succumbed to a long-standing chest infection. Nevertheless he leaves two fine daughters being beautifully raised by their mothers. As always with animals, triumph quickly follows tragedy, and vice-versa, so the birth of a female fur seal at Living Coasts was very welcome, but then tempered by the failure of her mother to produce sufficient milk, leaving the keepers with the laborious but rewarding duty of rearing her by hand.

The Trust and its zoos are run by professional managers but overseen by voluntary trustees who have to make the big, strategic, decisions for the managers to implement. It follows that the character and skill sets of the trustees are very important and we were sad when Anya Calcott had to step down from the Board for personal reasons. We were delighted when two new trustees joined during the year, Judy Ravenscroft and Peter Stevens, the former from the Environment Agency and the latter being a former Director of Paignton Zoo and the WWCT.

Other notable events that delivered on our strategic objectives were: the awarding of a grant from the Leverhulme Foundation to the Trust and its partners at the University of Exeter, for the development of a field test for the chytrid fungus that is devastating amphibian populations across the globe; the hosting of an extremely successful workshop at Paignton Zoo on primate nutrition for zoo staff from across Europe; the donation of a substantial sum to the Cross River gorilla conservation project following our Great Gorillas Project in 2013; and the filming of Paignton Zoo’s orang-utans by Sir David Attenborough and his crew for his series on Attenborough’s Natural Curiosities.

All in all, it was another diverse and fascinating year in our history.

Our vision

A world rich in wildlife and wild places

Our mission

The WWCT is an education, scientific and conservation charity dedicated to protecting our global wildlife heritage and inspiring in people a respect for animals, plants and the environment.

Our strategic aims

• Education and engagement of the public on the conservation of the natural world

• In situ conservation of species and habitats• Ex situ conservation of threatened species • Conservation advocacy: shaping behaviour-change for the benefit of

biodiversity

Whitley Wildlife Conservation Trust

The Whitley Wildlife Conservation Trust is the charity founded in Herbert Whitley’s name after his death in the 1950s. It continues his ideals of conservation and education through high quality visitor attractions, scientific study and field projects at home and abroad.

The Trust is the umbrella organisation for the three zoos, two Local Nature Reserves and one National Nature Reserve, Slapton Ley.

Paignton Zoo Environmental Park

Paignton Zoo was founded in 1923 by an eccentric millionaire and pioneering conservationist, Herbert Whitley.

Over the years Paignton Zoo has grown to become one of the leading British zoos and a popular family day out. It has a well-earned reputation for science and research and supports conservation projects at home and abroad.

Paignton Zoo’s unique system of habitat zones makes the most of its well-wooded valley home. The collection is diverse, ranging from large mammals to tiny amphibians and from flocks of exotic birds to rare and unusual invertebrates. Paignton Zoo is also a botanic garden, with rare and special plants helping to set the scene in and around the animal enclosures.

Living Coasts

Living Coasts, Torquay’s Coastal Zoo and Aquarium is dedicated to protecting marine and coastal wildlife. It holds an excellent collection of rare and unusual marine and coastal species including penguins, auks and wading birds. It is home to a lively group of South American fur seals and the aquarium contains stingrays, mudskippers, seahorses and octopuses.

Naturalistic habitats are used to give its animals the best environment in which to live and breed. Visitors are encouraged to look at protecting not only species but also the habitats in which they live.

Newquay Zoo

Opened in 1969, the Zoo has become one of the country’s most well-respected zoos, with ground breaking and innovative conservation programmes. Winning many major environmental and sustainability awards and set in 13 acres of lush tropical gardens, it has proved itself to be one of the best attractions in the South West.

Specialising in breeding many endangered species, Newquay Zoo is at the forefront of conservation and education, leading the way in exciting innovative enclosure design, enrichment projects and overseas conservation.

Introducing the Whitley Wildlife Conservation Trust

The EAZA Pole to Pole campaign was a common focus for our education teams this year. Encouraging and motivating visitors to reduce their environmental impact through carbon reductions, Pole to Pole is directly aligned to the WWCT strategy.

Living Coasts’ education department incorporated large interpretation displays, a themed quiz and trail and a Pole to Pole puppet show for the younger audience which has been performed for numerous school groups and the general public to great acclaim. In addition, Teignmouth Arts Group built a full-size igloo from recycled milk bottles at the Living Coasts entrance.

Newquay established a Pole to Pole trail and provided visitors and students themed colouring and word search activities alongside a leaflet outlining ‘5 things to do’ to help reduce carbon emissions. In addition, a Pole to Pole focus was given at their penguin feed talks in the high season.

Paignton Zoo ran ‘Making Sense of Global Environmental Change’, funded by Alcoa Howmet, reaching over 55,000 visitors through activities such as Eco-Play Your Cards Right - popular games with an eco-twist. Almost 100% of participants told us that they enjoyed the games, learned something new and, on completing a follow-up questionnaire, almost ¾ of respondents declared that they had made lifestyle changes as a result – an excellent outcome!

Across all three sites, the number of education bookings has been encouraging this year with increases in both the number of students attending and the proportion of these participating in sessions led by education staff.

Paignton Zoo 2013/14 has been a busy year for Paignton Zoo’s education team. Alongside completion of the Making Sense of Global Environmental Change project and our regular school workshops, clubs, holiday activities and presentations, we evaluated and further developed WWCT’s education programme in Nigeria, launched a joint Energy & Water Challenge for schools with South West Water, delivered teacher training days and developed a series of CREST Award sessions, accredited by the British Association. This year has also seen us bring delivery in line with Living Coasts and Newquay Zoo by establishing a presenting team.

Many activities were themed around invertebrates as the Zoo kicked off the 10 year countdown to its centenary with the Year of Invertebrates. Visitor activities included bug house building, leaf litter rummages and insect eating to examine the issue of sustainable food sources with visitors. The team was also heavily involved with creation of the new Investigate Incredible Invertebrates exhibit, focusing on how invertebrates have inspired and informed human developments in fields such as medicine, architecture and robotics.

Education and engagement

Living Coasts This year, Living Coasts rolled out a Fantastic Fish theme during the school holidays, and to provide more educational activities on site we also delivered storytelling and puppet shows.

Talks on site have been well attended, with over 93% of visitors rating these as good or excellent, and visitors have been fascinated by our animal enrichment and training sessions. The most popular talks were for penguins, seals and otters and research shows that these presentations also significantly increased dwell time at the enclosures, enhancing the visitors’ experience by motivating them to see more of our animals.

Marine Conservation Zones and sustainable fishing are two topics addressed during any visit to Living Coasts. Both visitors and school groups have enjoyed the marine litter display on site, finding it very educational. Younger visitors continue to enjoy our monthly Waddles and Toddles toddler group. This continues to be very popular and, as with clubs at Newquay Zoo and Paignton Zoo, is regularly oversubscribed.

Newquay Zoo We have had a busy year of school workshops, offsite talks, Junior Keeper experiences and Cornwall College teaching. There has also been a welcome boost in school numbers, partly due to introduction of the new Cornwall Learning Inspire topic workshops, linked to the primary curriculum changes.

School holidays and weekends have remained busy with our popular Junior Keeper scheme and monthly Children’s Club workshops, Meerkat Mob and Zoo Cadets. We have also supported events by creating trails for Rare Birds and IUCN’s Red November, dressing up for Halloween and attending events such as the Royal Cornwall Show and Newquay Fish Festival. In addition, our encounter animals had national exposure when they were filmed live for CBBC ‘Wild’ in Cornwall.

The World War Zoo Gardens wartime allotment garden project continues to be developed and promoted through a range of activities from attending a local National Trust 1940s fair, running school history workshops and maintaining a research blog, to delivering talks on wartime zoos and gardens at the BGEN conference, Kew Gardens and IHR University of London, due to the WW1 centenary.

In situ conservation

This has been an extremely busy year with impressive progress being made in all our overseas regional programmes. In addition to our existing programmes we established a new project with SANCCOB to develop in-country rearing protocols for the bank cormorant in South Africa, the first trials should go ahead in 2015. In comparison, it was a quieter year for our UK conservation work with the main focus being ongoing management of our local nature reserves, where we have counted record numbers of bats roosting in the caves, and preparations for a trial reintroduction of strapwort to a second UK site, Loe Pool in Cornwall, in 2015.

Vietnam Regional ProgrammeThai Van Nguyen, who has worked at the Carnivore and Pangolin Conservation Project (CPCP) for many years, returned from completing an MSc in conservation in Australia and has transformed the work of the project. Under his leadership we have established an independent Vietnamese NGO, Save Vietnam’s Wildlife (SVW). SVW will continue to operate the CPCP centre with Cuc Phuong National Park, which houses wildlife, especially pangolins, confiscated from the illegal wildlife trade and conducts research on how best to rehabilitate them. In addition SVW are increasing the amount of field research on wild populations of pangolins, civets and other threatened wildlife and are developing new aspects of education and awareness-raising among various audiences. They are particularly targeting consumers of pangolin meat (still available in restaurants despite being illegal) and scales (traditional medicine), and the law enforcement officials who should be preventing this trade.

Highland East Africa Regional Programme Elena Tonelli, WWCT field team leader and PhD student at Manchester Metropolitan University, made good progress with fieldwork to determine amphibian species distribution and critical habitat in the Uzungwa Scarp Forest

Reserve in the Udzungwa Mountains. This information is vital

for conserving the unique frog species found in the forest, especially three “hyper-endemic” species that are only known from extremely localised and small sites. Of these Elena has confirmed presence of two species including the Kihanga reed frog in its historical location and also at a new site 7km away. Unfortunately she has still not located any Poynton’s forest toad, which has not now been seen for 10 years. In total she has found 18 different frog species, at least one of which is new to science. After long delays due to funding difficulties we at last began a Tanzanian national survey for Abbot’s duiker, this has started with surveys of the Kilimanjaro forest by our partner Serena Brunisso of the University of Florence. She has obtained the first camera trap pictures of Abbot’s duiker from this area so has been able to confirm their presence here and has collected many dung samples, which will be sent to us for DNA analysis at the University of Exeter.

Other programmesIn Sulawesi, our programme manager Harry Hilser began a PhD through the University of Exeter to investigate how best to communicate conservation messages associated with our Selamatkan Yaki – Save the Sulawesi Macaque project. His work is already helping to inform and improve our education and awareness raising activities including Green Gospel (working with churches), shooting competitions (targeting hunters directly) and youth camps. Unfortunately Harry was away from the programme for several weeks due to illness but the excellent team

in Sulawesi, which now includes seven other staff members, continued with the projects as planned and ensured the whole programme was still in good shape when Harry returned. In Zimbabwe, work under the Conservation Across Boundaries theme in the Matobo Hills included delivering training on use of GIS technology for park rangers, camera trap surveys for rhino and other mammals, environmental and biodiversity monitoring education for local schools and a resource assessment of the whole area including human, wildlife and ecosystem features. Despite the ebola outbreak in West Africa WWCT staff Andrew Bowkett (Conservation Programmes Manager) and Louise Coombes (Educator) made two visits to the Omo Forest in Nigeria. They evaluated the effectiveness of the environmental education programme and helped our local staff to develop new lesson plans with an emphasis on participation and interaction. In addition, they were able to visit the Cross River gorilla project in the Mbe Mountains to see how funds raised from Paignton Zoo’s Great Gorillas Project have been used. In Kenya, the final results of our surveys of Boni-Dodori Forest with the Kenyan Wildlife Service were published showing that the area is probably the most important site for Aders’ duiker, with estimated population density many times greater than the only other known mainland site, Arabuko-Sokoke Forest and the total area of suitable habitat over three times greater than all other known sites together.

Paignton ZooDespite the poor weather early in the year 2014 was very much a case of business as usual in the living collections. The major new construction was the Investigate invertebrates exhibit in the centre of the Zoo which allowed us to get species such as leaf-cutter ants back on exhibit after a hiatus of several years. Another significant return was the arrival of a beautiful pair of golden lion tamarins, which have been out of the collection for almost a decade. This species is very closely managed internationally so we had to wait our turn for a pair to become available. Other important moves dictated by breeding programmes also led to all bar one of our subadult Indian lions being transferred to

other collections, and the breeding female Sumatran tiger being ‘retired’ to a zoo in France

having already reared her lifetime quota of young. A new female, with a breeding recommendation, arrived from Berlin, and quickly managed to knock herself cold by attempting to jump through an armoured glass window and catch a visitor. Tiger and visitor survived without lasting damage but with very exciting memories!

Notable births during the year included our first tarictic hornbills, four species of lories (nectar-eating parrots), mangrove snakes, yellow-headed day geckos, another Indo-Chinese box turtle, a red panda, and a pygmy slow loris.

We were pleased to receive many plants of 11 different species of bamboos from a private collection. A pair of Mitchell’s lorikeet (a critically endangered species) was an important addition to the lory/lorikeet collection, and two false gharials from a zoo in Denmark were added to the one specimen we already had in the hope that we can breed this strange crocodilian in the future.

No less than 26 hazel dormice were sent for release in the summer as part of the English Nature recovery programme for the species. Red-legged seriemas and blue-crowned laughing thrushes were sent to the USA to boost captive programmes for both species, the latter of which is critically endangered in the wild.

Having ensured that his genes were passed on to the next generation in the form of his two daughters, born in 2013, the zoo’s male orang utan, Demo, died after a long, respiratory-related, illness early in 2014. He will not be replaced in the short term as the females will be occupied with child rearing for the next few years.

Ex situ conservation

Living Coasts The highlight of 2014 was the birth of

Gemini, a South American fur seal pup whose birth brought in extra visits from the members and summer

visitors. It was no easy task for the keeper team – as the seal’s mum Grace did not produce any milk and she had

to be hand reared from day one. A diet of warm fishy, cream shakes

four times day built the pup up and dedicated keepers even gave her a first swimming lesson and nursed

her through a stomach upset. She was weaned at the end of December – on to warm whole

fish and moved back in with her mother and the other seals.

The Living Coasts site suffered from the stormy weather at the start of the year. Many wooden structures on site were blown down or damaged. Some birds were taken inside during the extreme weather to maintain warmth and keep dry. The site closed on 5th February due to flooding caused by the storms and closed early on the 7th February due to waves blocking access. Our net repair company fixed a couple of significant holes in the net after the storms and then later in the year replaced five whole panels of the net structure.

Warm weather during the summer led to an increase in the number of mosquitoes in and around the site and we lost five Macaroni penguins as a result of avian malaria. This was a significant blow to the population that was only partially offset by the hatching of two chicks in the extended nesting area. A flock of African penguins were donated, as planned to Tblisi Zoo in Georgia and Inca terns and avocets were sent to other European zoos as usual.

Another satisfying breeding result was with the blue-spotted ribbon-tail rays and blue-spotted sting rays, both species producing ten young

each which will be dispersed to other European aquaria over the coming months.

The problems we previously faced with temperature control in the aquarium were rectified by the addition of ducting for cooling the Local Coasts and Octopus Odyssey areas (for the summer) and heating to the mangrove area (for the winter).

The planting programme for Living Coasts was re-planned and the site will be moving away from all native plant species to add in South American and South African planting and more colourful native coastal plants for 2015 - 2018.

Newquay ZooWe had a number of births and hatchings that are noteworthy including: ring-tailed lemur, squirrel monkey, cusimanse, Visayan warty

pig, lesser mouse deer and black wildebeest. Our family group of Swinhoe’s striped squirrels had a

minor population explosion with over twenty offspring over the course of the year, many of

which have found new homes in others zoos.

Our interesting and varied bird collection continues to expand reflected by this year’s breeding results. Species reared to independence include: Madagascar partridge, Humboldt penguin, Luzon bleeding heart dove, Namaqua dove, greater Vasa parrot, blue magpie, broad-ringed white-eye, grosbeak starling, blue-crowned laughing thrush, yellow-crowned bishop and ultramarine grosbeak. Most pleasing was the hatching of a Blyth’s hornbill. The adult pair had been at Paignton Zoo for a number of years without recent success, so the change of air in Cornwall obviously inspired them to produce their magnificent offspring.

The Tropical House reproduced a number of interesting reptiles and amphibians including: elongated tortoise, brown horn-headed lizard, curly-tailed lizard, Portuguese fire salamander, yellow & black poison dart frog, phantasmal poison dart frog, black-legged poison dart frog and bamboo tree frog.

There were a number of arrivals, most notably a group of black-tailed marmosets from

Shaldon Wildlife Trust, and a pair of white-throated capuchin monkeys from the Vallee des Singes in France (a new species to the collection). Last year we returned a male

Owston’s civet, born at Newquay, to our project partners at the Carnivore and

Pangolin Conservation Centre in Vietnam and were very pleased to receive a new male from them after many months of paperwork.

Significant bird arrivals include: a group of harlequin quails from Magdeburg Zoo; a pair of collared hill partridges from a private collection in Holland; and ten blue-crowned hanging parrots, a pair of yellow-rumped tinker birds and a pair of red-billed fire finches from a private collection. Following the completion of our new “Birds of Brazil” aviary, we acquired four scarlet macaws, seven blue-throated conures, a large group of spectacled parrotlets, a pair of ringed teal, a pair of Brazilian tanagers, four red-cowled cardinals, and a group of saffron finches from various European zoos and private collections.

We received five radiated tortoises which were part of HM Customs seizure in Holland, four Vietnamese golden geckos, three Madagascar giant day geckos and three young royal pythons for the Education Department to handle during our animal encounters. We completed a new exhibit to display golden silk spiders and received two very striking females. Twenty-five Seychelles giant millipedes were also a new, endangered, species for the collection.

Conservation advocacy

People are the biggest factor in determining the success of conservation projects and we have continued to develop actions and research on this area of our strategy: promoting human behaviour change to benefit conservation. Michelle Gurney (Visitor Research Officer) began research at Newquay Zoo to understand how people use the site and how to improve their experiences and thus enhance our ability to convey important messages about wildlife. Michelle will move to Paignton Zoo in 2015 and work closely with our Advocacy Officer to combine knowledge on the links between visitor experience and behaviour change.

Marine Conservation ZonesFollowing the designation of Torbay as a Marine Conservation Zone in 2013, Living Coasts and especially Clare Rugg (Operations Manager) has continued to promote marine conservation in the Bay and to work with other groups to ensure the success of the MCZ. Clare has taken over the chair of the Sea Torbay Conservation Group, which is

responsible for developing codes of conduct for the MCZ, and is also the conservation champion on the Tor Bay

Harbour Users Forum and the Marine Tourism and Fisheries Forum; she has

campaigned for marine conservation in local, regional and national forums, even at Westminster. Living Coasts has promoted the MCZ through numerous events on and off site including a business breakfast, Fantastic Fish event, beach cleans, Brixham’s Fishstock festival, and various talks for yacht clubs and other interest groups. We are especially pleased to be a partner in the Community Seagrass Initiative which was awarded Heritage Lottery Funding in 2014. We will be working very closely with the Torbay project officer for this initiative to help monitor and improve the status of seagrass beds in the Bay, home to our local seahorses.

Resource efficiency and Environmental managementOnce again all three zoo sites successfully retained their ISO14001 accreditation for Environmental Management Systems (EMS) and in recognition of our commitment in this area our Environmental Officer, Peter Morgan, was appointed as Chair of the Devon Environmental Business Initiative. In this role he will be helping to inform and motivate Devon businesses of all sizes and sectors to adopt good environmental practices. We also aim to motivate our zoo visitors to do the same, which at Paignton Zoo has been done using an innovative ‘gamification’ method. We have shown this to be very effective and our results were presented by Michelle Bales (Educator) at the International Zoo Educators Conference in Hong Kong.

Responsible purchasing The catering and retail staff have continued to campaign about palm oil and to work with their suppliers to develop palm-oil free products for sale on the zoo sites. In addition they helped spread awareness of the conservation impacts of palm oil among caterers, retailers and the public through a presentation at the Exeter Festival of South

West Food and Drink. Thanks, in part, to ourselves and other zoos campaigning through the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria, new EU-wide legislation came into force at the end of 2014 requiring any food products containing palm oil to be clearly labelled. This makes it much easier for us and all consumers to make informed choices and spend wisely. The team has also continued to work on other fairly traded, environmentally responsible and ethical product lines such as coffee, chocolate, clothes, jewellery and other gifts.

Conservation ScienceOther important developments in conservation science largely feature amphibians. We were really excited to be awarded a large Leverhulme Trust research grant, together with our partners from the University of Exeter. This funding will be used to develop a rapid test for chytrid fungus which causes a fatal disease in amphibians and is one of the major causes of the ongoing global amphibian extinction crisis. Existing tests for chytrid are based on DNA analysis and can take several weeks

from initial sample collection to receiving the results. The proposed new test will work in a similar way to pregnancy tests, indicating positive results after just a few seconds if the sample contains chytrid. This will be a great help to amphibian conservation workers in zoos, universities and in the field to monitor whether their animals are at risk of this deadly disease. In addition, we are supporting a PhD by Wayne Edwards (University of Kent) who is based in Paignton Zoo’s Amphibian Ark. Wayne is using climate-controlled chambers or “froggotrons” to investigate the environmental requirements and the potential impacts of climate change for golden mantella frogs – a highly threatened species from Madagascar.

After a period of terrible weather at the start of the year visitor numbers recovered well in 2014 but were never likely to meet the levels of the previous year. All three sites saw a small fall in the number of paying heads, although at Paignton and Newquay the levels were still ahead of those seen in 2011/12. We continued to keep a tight control on costs and as a result the group generated a surplus of £896,546.

Whitley Wildlife Conservation Trust (WWCT) increased the funds available to its charitable activities with a surplus for the year of £65,017 after receiving a donation of £50,000 from the Binks Trust. The Trust continued to provide financial support to several research projects in Africa and elsewhere and assisted the Field Studies Council by contributing to the running of Slapton Ley National Nature Reserve. The Net Assets of the Trust on 31st October 2012 stood at £11,062,692.

South West Environmental Parks Ltd (SWEPL) continued to operate Paignton and Newquay Zoos. It provided financial support to Living Coasts totalling £60,000 and to conservation projects in Africa and elsewhere of £75,998.

Paignton Zoo’s visitor numbers fell from 462,660 in 2012/13 to 439,716 in 2013/14. Visitors to Newquay however were up slightly from 156,573 to 158,151. The fall in visitors is attributed to the economic conditions and the fact that the weather at the start of the year was particularly poor. As a result, SWEPL showed a surplus for the year of £831,529. Visitors to Living Coasts continued to increase, rising 3% to 125,080. As a result gate income was up so the loss for the year (discounting SWEPL’s donation) was £101,460, which is substantially reduced from

previous years. Living Coasts continues to require support from SWEPL however the prospect of achieving breakeven is increasing.

South West Zoo Enterprises Limited, the group’s trading company, again performed well, given the difficult economic conditions. Turnover of just over £3.67 million was very slightly up on the previous year and the company increased its donation to SWEPL to £651,802, along with a donation to Living Coasts of £783.

After a number of difficult years the group is now well positioned to continue its charitable activities, despite an operating environment which continues to prove challenging.

Finance report

The Whitley Wildlife Conservation Trust, Paignton Zoo Environmental Park, Living Coasts & Newquay Zoo Annual Review & Accounts 2013-14

Registered charity no:300923

Registered charity no:306622

Registered charity no:1099076

Registered charity no:300923