Plymouth Zoo

I'm sure that many people will have fond memories of Plymouth Zoo. I remember going there in the late 1960s and a pelican called Percy following us around. It was a lovely place to start off with but got a bit run down and smelly towards the end. Amazingly, the zoo was only open for 16 years.It opened on Thursday April 19th 1962 at a cost of £30,000 and it had 13,000 visitors during the first three days. The zoo was owned by the Chipperfields and was a very popular attraction.It had many animals including chimpanzees, polar bears, seals, camels, giraffes and lions etc.There's a great movie at the Pathe News site and all the animals look very happy. I know the keepers were very interested in their welfare and got quite attached to the animals. When you're a kid, a zoo seems a wonderous place but when you're older and with hindsight, it seems unfair keeping them all cooped up in cages. I remember the chimpanzees at the beginning of the zoo would collect up gravel and throw it at the visitors! There was an article about a chimp in the news in a Swedish Zoo,three days ago,doing exactly the same thing and it was reported as if it was something new.

I remember the sweet popcorn that was sold at the cafe to feed the animals. All the kids always ended up eating it themselves though I'm sure it wouldn't have done the animals much good anyway. I remember there was a giraffe that was about to swallow a popcorn packet. Luckily, the keeper managed to get it off him before he choked!

There was a children's area with guinea pigs and rabbits and a huge tortoise which I believe was a gift from the Navy in the early 1960s.
The zoo closed on Sunday January 8th 1978 and was later converted into a skateboard park. Now, I think it's just a piece of waste ground.
We certainly had some good times there and I miss it but I think with concerns over animal welfare, I'm quite glad that it's no longer there.