Maggie the Red Panda enjoys the snow at Banham Zoo. Photograph Simon Parker

Photo gallery: Animal magic for snow-covered Banham Zoo

Rebecca Gough Wednesday, January 16, 2013
8:31 AM

We all cope differently in the snow, some revel and others struggle, and it’s no different for our animal friends, as staff at Banham Zoo can attest.

Some, used to the snow and freezing temperatures, basked in the white stuff yesterday, while others poked noses and paws into the open air, enjoying the sunshine, but crept back indoors when the weather became too much.

Keepers, meanwhile, wrapped up warm as they kept an eye on their charges in the first snowfall of the winter which left much of the county covered in three or four inches of snow.

Animal manager Mike Woolham said the zoo was always prepared for extreme weather, which became “magical” in the snow.

“Some of the animals we’ve got here are very well adapted, like the red pandas and the snow leopards, and for the animals that come from tropical climates there’s this wonderful thing called a thermometer,” he said.

“Of course the other thing that’s fairly important in the snow is checking structures because of snow on the roofs, particularly the aviary roofs, and we tend to use the tried and tested method – a broom.”