Island Life Magazine Ltd December 2010/January 2011 | Page 60
interview
Island Life - December 2010
Photo:Aysha
Photo: Zena the one eyed Tiger
Photo:Charlotte hand feeding a Tiger
lemur lounge. I was given the keys to
rolling. He was a great showman, in
handling would drive her father to
an old caravan.” She lived there for
the mould of John Aspinal or Gerald
distraction, she says, and she is wistful
a few years, hand rearing tigers such
Durrell.”
that the immediacy of the connection
as Zena, the zoo’s iconic white tiger,
The zoo was more than showtime for
is more difficult to achieve. “Now
who had a habit of stalking Charlotte’s
Jack Corney, though. Enthusing others
we have to work so much harder to
best friend when she came to stay.
with his own passion for animals was
generate the same kinds of feelings
“Whenever Tina went to the house for
his driving force. “I still have people
in people. They don’t remember facts
a shower, wrapped in a towel, I’d hear
who come back today and say they met
about how many tigers are left in the
this shriek, and Zena had leapt on her
my dad thirty odd years ago, and he
wild or how you tell the difference
back!”
transformed the way they felt about the
between a jaguar and a leopard – they
natural world.”
remember things that switch a light
No wonder she says she can’t answer
that question everyone asks: what
This is the baton which Charlotte is
on, like seeing a tiger biting a wave on
Sandown beach.”
would you be doing if not working
now running with, using the zoo to
with animals? She has always been an
inspire others to love wildlife. What is
integral part of the zoo, acting, with
more of a challenge now is continuing
the morality of zoos is astonishing.
her sister, as plants in the crowd when
to employ her father’s hands-on
“There isn’t a day that goes past when
her father asked if anyone wanted to
approach. The health and safety
I don’t think ‘I’ve raised an animal from
hold a snake. “It was to get the ball
protocol needed today to allow snake
a cub and keep it in an enclosure’.
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Her reaction when questioned about
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