Carol, pig tail macaque

HUHA – Helping You Help Animals is an animal sanctuary in Upper Hutt, Wellington, who do wonderful work rescuing, rehabilitating and re-homing animals in need.  They have agreed to home all the remaining animals which noone else will take from the Franklin Zoo & Wildlife Sanctuary. 1x ex-circus pig tail macaque monkey, 3x capuchin monkeys and 1x 20 year old one eyed hawk.  The Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust has been helping HUHA raise funds to complete the new enclosures for these last remaining animals.  $16,000 has so far been raised with just $14,000 left to complete the enclosures.  You can donate directly to them: www.huha.org.nz and for more information

Click here to read our newsletter regarding HUHA and their great work regarding our last few animals

Newsletter for HUHA

Mila, ex circus elephant plays in her habitat

Click on the link below to see the Campbell Live show aired on TV3 on 25 April 2013 and hear the plans for Mila, ex circus elephant who is being rehabilitated at Franklin Zoo & Wildlife Sanctuary ready for her move to the US to live with other African elephants.

A tribute by Campbell Live to Dr Helen Schofield on the anniversary of her passing and an update on Mila.

Click here, http://donations.franklinzoo.co.nz

Our fund raising campaign is going well to secure funding for the care and future of Mila, and has assisted the Franklin Zoo & Wildlife Sanctuary to re-home all of it’s animals and birds to appropriate facilities who are taking care of their individual welfare needs.

Mila will travel to her new home in the US later in the year 2013 and your contributions to the Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust assist us in continuing to care for her needs here and will fund her transportation costs.  We are well on our way to achieving Dr Helen Schofield’s dream for Mila, the only African elephant in New Zealand and an ex circus African elephant, to live out her life with other African elephants.

The support for this dream has been fantastic. We have had individuals from NZ and around the world.  This has enabled Mila’s Move to become a reality and we will provide updates during the year as we progress.  The support from many individuals has also allowed us to recruit the services of Erin Ivory from the US who is working with Mila and building great trust with her.  Erin uses only positive reinforcement training methods, following on from Helen, to train Mila for her medical testing and checks.  Mila is responding really well and loves her daily training sessions and is learning new behaviours every day.

Mila enjoying the rain and mud 16 July 2012

The Franklin Zoo & Wildlife Sanctuary is closed permanently

The Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust would like to thank our local community, friends and supporters, and staff from Franklin Zoo for their support following the death of Dr Helen Schofield – the heart and soul of Franklin Zoo. Dr Schofield provided a facility to care for native and exotic animals in need. 

It has been a very difficult year as we have come to terms with this tragedy, and tried to perform Helen’s multiple roles as accredited vet, zoo operator and director, and elephant programme manager (all unpaid). However, Helen is irreplaceable and this is why the Trustees have had to make the incredibly difficult decision to close Franklin Zoo.

Franklin Zoo’s dedicated staff are all deeply saddened by this decision, but understand that Mila and all of our animals deserve to live lives that are as full and enriching as possible. We are grateful that they will continue to work with us, to achieve this.

 Helen dedicated her life to animals, and her greatest dream was for Mila, the last circus elephant in NZ, to be moved to a facility where she could live out the rest of her days with other elephants.  There are no other African elephants in New Zealand. We will be able to realise this dream with the fantastic support we have had from individuals donating to this cause. We will achieve Helen’s dream, and we believe that the best way to honour this is to focus resources into our goal of working towards Mila’s relocation to a facility overseas so that we can secure and provide for her future.

We have been worked closely with the Australasian Zoo & Aquarium Association and the Ministry for Primary Industries to successfully find homes for the all the animals and birds in our care, and secure their futures. Auckland Zoo staff including their vet team, have assisted us in the care of Mila and all the animals, for which we are very grateful.

We would like to thank everyone who has donated to our fundraising efforts to cover the day to day care of all the animals at Franklin Zoo and towards our goal of relocating Mila to a facility overseas. We are well on our way to achieving this goal and are really pleased with the fund raising so far and are extremely grateful to everybody who has donated.  We are a long way ahead but still have some way to go to secure Mila’s future.  The funding will pay for Mila’s transport NZ side, logistics, travel crate, cranes, trucks, medical testing, chartered cargo flight, quarantine and transport in the US towards the end of 2013.

The ongoing fundraising remains our top priority, so if you would like to donate to the Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust, please visit our website www.franklinzoo.co.nz

0r you can donate by direct credit to The Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust,

National Bank of NZ, account number 06-0401-0327303-00

or post a cheque to Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust, 83 Ridge Road RD4, Tuakau, Auckland 2694.

We are very sad to report that Ruby the lion has passed away.  Ruby was over 20 years old and a dear and much-loved member of the Franklin Zoo family.  Like many old cats she had been increasingly showing signs that her kidneys were failing by drinking large quantities of water.  Despite this she appeared to be happy and continued to eat and behave normally.  But, on 20^th May her behaviour changed dramatically in that she went off her food and we saw her sitting and lying in unusual places, occasionally a bit unsteady and dry retching.  By next day she was also breathing quite heavily even at rest and so, on 22^nd May, we asked Auckland Zoo vet, Dr Richard Jakob-Hoff to look at her.  After a thorough examination under anaesthetic, Dr Jakob-Hoff said that her signs were consistent with ‘end-stage’ kidney failure and that she was unlikely to live more than a few more days.  He felt that the onset of cold weather, which had just started, would put more stress on her body and recommended that she be humanely put to sleep while still under anaesthetic.  We all felt this was the kindest option for her and watched as she quietly passed away in her sleep when given an over-dose of anaesthetic drug.  She was buried the following day in a grave on the grounds where she had lived for so many years.

Eddie Gypsie Queenie first day in new enclosure

Due to the tragic accidental death of Dr Helen Schofield the Sanctuary is closed to the public. The Franklin Zoo and Wildlife Sanctuary is a very special place. It is a privilege to have our wonderful supporters, help us, to make it possible to care for our special needs  birds, reptiles and animals. The circus lions, and now Jumbo (Mila) the African elephant, have been able to retire and rehabilitate from circus life, because we – the sanctuary – exists. Providing sanctuary for these animals is not, and has never been, easy. The challenges finding funding, managing animal health & care and dealing with the political and human elements are very real and sometimes soul destroying. However we are here primarily for the transformation of these magnificent creatures  and it is so very worthwhile. They are an absolute joy!

Click here to view complete newsletter for October 2010

In 2006, at our expense, we retired the circus lions Eddie and the girls. What followed was a transformation of the three lions from sadness and inactivity to active and fun loving lions. Once the girls had passed, it was then time to think about Jumbo (Mila) again!

There are several projects being undertaken by the Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust which require funding, sponsorship or donations.

Mila playing with mud

The elephant: Grumpy’s Barn – Mila’s (Jumbo’s) barn is up and she is enjoying her large indoor space anytime she likes including a nice big sand pit to play and stand in.

We are now fund raising to continue to care for Mila and secure her future move to another sanctuary to be with other African elephants.  We aim to achieve this by June 2013 and require $1.15m for this elephant programme alone.

We need funds to continue to care for all the other animals until their new homes are ready for them in the next few months.

 If you would like to contribute to any of these projects, you can donate directly on this web site or by direct credit to the Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust. BSB: 060401 Acc: 0327303 00 or by phoning us on 09 236 8686.  Please be sure to send us all your address details so that we can send you a Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust receipt for your taxation purposes.

BINGARRA, Brolga crane has now moved back to his original home at Hamilton Zoo.

Bingarra, an Australian Brolga crane, has recently moved in to Franklin Zoo & Wildlife Sanctuary from Hamilton zoo.  He was hatched at Auckland zoo on June 2005. The Brolga is a gregarious wetland bird species from tropical and eastern Australia, well known for its intricate mating dance. This mating dance involves beautiful movements such as flapping of wings and bobbing up and down; very like ballet in fact. It is the official bird emblem of the state of Queensland.  Their numbers are threatened by their wetlands gradually drying up and the closer encroachment of mankind.

Brolgas are omnivorous and eat a variety of wetland plants, insects, invertebrates, and amphibians. They also eat seeds, molluscs and crustaceans. Here at the Sanctuary Bingarra enjoys a wide variety of food, and is settling in well living beside Eugene the Tammar Wallaby and also is visited frequently during each day by our seven free ranging Peacocks.

Mila in mid purrrrrr!

African elephant retired from the circus, enjoys playing in the rain loves her variety of mud, dirt and sand wallows around her new enclosure at Franklin Zoo & Wildlife Sanctuary.  The Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust has built her new elephant house thanks to some very generous donations and still needs funds or sponsorship to complete her drainage and plumbing to her new winter barn.

If you would like to contribute to the care of Mila and work to complete her barn you can donate to the Franklin Zoo Charitable Trust, Account No: 06-0401-0327303-02 and let us know your name and address so that we can send you your receipt. info@franklinzoo.co.nz or ph +64 9 236 8686

Mila in front of her new barn