It’s the good life at Birmingham Wildlife Conservation Park!

National Allotments Week (10-16 August) highlights the benefits of growing your own produce regardless of gender and age – but it’s not just people who benefit.  At Birmingham Wildlife Conservation Park on Pershore Road, the animals tuck into home-grown fruit, veg and herbs all year round.

From lemon balm, lovage and lettuce to blackberries and bamboo, the meerkats, monkeys, lemurs and lynx all enjoy a healthy diet with food grown just whiskers away in the park’s Eco-Garden!

Grown on site -

• Herbs: lemon balm, thyme, sage, rosemary, parsley, chives & lovage (these are used for enrichment)
• Fruit: strawberries, blackberries (animals are fed whole cuttings of bramble), rhubarb (all used for feed)
• Vegetables / Salad leaves: carrots, tomatoes, potatoes, chard, romaine lettuce, courgettes, and beans (all used for feed)
• Weeds such as plantain and dandelions to add to ‘salad’ portions of diets, and cut things like hawthorn, bamboo etc. to feed as browse.

Animals enjoying the home-grown veg include - lemurs, meerkats, binturong, porcupines, all the primates, otters, lynx and ocelots.

Birmingham Wildlife Conservation Park is open daily from 10am – 5pm, last admission 4pm, during the summer months.  Admission is £5.50 for adults, £3 for children 3-15 years old and under 3s go free.

For more information see Birmingham.gov.uk/naturecentre

-ends-

For more media information contact Press and PR officer Debbie Harrison on 303 4476