History of Edinburgh Zoo
In the 21st century Edinburgh Zoo was briefly forced to close by the 2001 foot-and-mouth outbreak, and in 2005 received threats from the Animal Liberation Front.
After the death of James Donaldson, a wealthy Scottish publisher and bookseller, the gardens of his country house, Broughton Hall (the area now covered by Bellevue) were converted into a zoological park.
[3] Occupying a 6-acre (2.4 ha) site, the park was situated about a mile to the north-east of Central Edinburgh, near East Claremont Street.
[5] The Zoological Gardens opened in 1839 with a collection of stock zoo animals including lions, tigers, monkeys, bears and an elephant.
At the time, animals in zoos were typically held in poor conditions in small, cramped cages, and the Zoological Gardens presented no exception.
Despite these setbacks, the menagerie attempted to maintain its popularity by putting on concerts, acrobatics shows and displays of fireworks and Montgolfier balloons.
[1][6][7] Edinburgh Zoo was created by Thomas Haining Gillespie, a solicitor from Dumfries who dreamed of establishing a zoological park in Scotland.
At first he was told that tropical animals would never be able to live in a cold climate like Edinburgh's—a view that had to some extent been borne out by the failure of the Royal Zoological Gardens.
The Society's first president was lawyer and politician Edward Theodore Salvesen, son of the Norwegian merchant Christian Salveson—a connection which would prove significant in later years.
[1] A series of lectures given to the society by J. Arthur Thomson gave yet more momentum to the modern approach being spearheaded by Hagenbeck in Germany.
These modern zoological parks promoted a more spacious and natural environment for the animals, and stood in stark contrast to the steel cages typical of the menageries built during the Victorian era.
The Scottish National Zoological Park, as it was initially called, opened to the public with a large collection of donated and borrowed animals on 22 July 1913, after only 15 weeks of work.
[7][10] It was in 1928 that the Corstorphine Golf Club finally evacuated the 47 acres (19 ha) to the north of the estate, allowing the zoo to expand significantly.
[7] Hagenbeck's modern zoo techniques proved effective, and Edinburgh quickly gained a reputation for its good animal conditions.
Visitors were so delighted with the procession that it became a regular occurrence, and today around two-thirds of the zoo's penguins parade round the park every day.
[18] Today its focus has changed and it primarily houses tundra species, including some animals which have been moved from Edinburgh Zoo itself.
[25] In 2005 the new Budongo chimp house was unveiled,[26] along with the Living Links to Human Evolution Centre, Britain's first primate behaviour research site.
[28] In late 2005 the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) threatened action over the holding in captivity of Mercedes, then Britain's only polar bear.
Edinburgh's treatment of polar bears had often been subject to criticism, punctuated by incidents like the death in 1997 of Mercedes' partner Barney, who choked on a plastic child's toy thrown into his enclosure.
[29] In 2009 the zoo carried out their plans to create a new exhibit and improve conditions for Mercedes, moving her to the Highland Wildlife Park, where she was joined by a young male polar bear named Walker.
[30] In January 2006 the zoo put forward plans to sell off 15 acres (6.1 ha) of land in order to raise funds for the ongoing redevelopment.
[36] Organised opposition to the sale resulted in the zoo being allowed to sell only a small portion of the originally proposed land.
