NATIONAL DAY

If animals are your passion then Visit the Zoo Day gives you a great opportunity to really get close to some of the most intriguing and engaging species on the planet. No matter where you live, your usually not far from a zoo, so why not go for a visit and find out more?Some people think of zoos only as cruel prisons where countless animals are kept, bored to death, from the moment theyre born till the moment they die. But these days zoos are at the forefront of much of the research which goes on into animal behaviour and how best to protect vulnerable animals from extinction. Many zoos have breeding programmes running, where they work with other facilities around the world to increase the numbers of endangered populations.In most of the better zoos around the globe, the enclosures the animals are kept in are relatively roomy and attempt to mirror an animals natural environment as closely as possible. Some zoos house indigenous species as well as or rather than those from further away. All in all, zos are fascinating (and often smelly) places where we can get a lot closer to nature than we would ever have the chance to otherwise, and thats definitely worth trying at least once or twice in life.