'Indy' stars as zoo mangroves open

AN £800,000 ADDITION to Torquay's coastal zoo at Living Coasts has opened.

Torquay is now home to an underground forest, venomous fish and dinosaur crabs thanks to the major new development funded by the Regional Development Agency.

Jungle explorer Indiana Jones, in the form of a professional actor — but not Harrison Ford — dodged giant boulders and escaped poisonous snakes at the launch yesterday. See our Video Console (right)

And tomorrow Living Coasts chiefs will be sitting down to decide what new attractions will be added next year.

Underground and previously under-used parts of Living Coasts have been transformed with new exhibits, new species and the latest technology.

Among the new animals are poisonous blue-spotted rays, upside-down jellyfish and horseshoe crab.

Visitors leave the open air exhibits of penguins and fur seals to plunge into a mangrove forest exhibit and fish tanks.

Living Coasts director Elaine Hayes said: “The ramp takes visitors from the top of the canopy, featuring firefly, bat and proboscis monkey models and sound and lighting effects, down into an underworld of roots and foliage.

“The visitor is immersed in the mangroves, exploring the swamp and discovering exotic species.

“We have focused on mangroves because they are delicate, complex, dynamic ecosystems.

“The destruction of mangroves has been dramatic, caused by over-exploitation, human development and pollution.”

She said the devastating cyclone in Burma which claimed more than 20,000 lives earlier this year would have been far less destructive had not the natural barrier of mangrove been destroyed to make way for development.

Mangroves have been described as the roots of the sea. They are found in places as diverse as Bangladesh, Florida, the Philippines, Thailand, Guyana and Sri Lanka.

Living Coasts, a registered charity, received a grant of £800,000 from the Regional Development Agency to support the work.

Ms Hayes said the planned developments will continue until March 2009 – and the theme of constant change in the future means that Living Coasts will have something new every year to bring people back.

She said the meeting tomorrow is to thrash out what sort of new species and attractions to bring to the site at Torquay harbour-side.

It could be new mammal species, a new species of penguin, or even a UK coastal exhibit which could feature sea-horses.

“That is what the meeting is about, to decide what we can have, so that everyone agrees.”