We save wildlife together, through conservation science research, working to protect species and habitats overseas, encouraging sustainable behaviours and perceptions, educating tomorrow’s wildlife warriors and giving families a great day out. Our conservation science efforts are worldwide, from helping re-introduce white clawed crayfish into UK rivers to working with communities in the Philippines to save the Critically Endangered Negros bleeding heart dove.

Bristol Zoo Gardens – one of our attractions – is the fifth-oldest zoo in the world and first opened its doors to the public on Monday 11 July 1836. Since then, it has started numerous conservation projects here in the UK and overseas, showed generations of school-aged children the value of nature for human society and has given more than 90 million visitors a great day out.

Our Zoo was founded on 22nd July 1835, by Henry Riley, a local physician, who led the formation of the Bristol, Clifton and West of England Zoological Society. Riley, and a number of other prominent local individuals, gathered with the mission to facilitate ‘the observation of habits, form and structure of the animal kingdom, as well as affording rational amusement and recreation to the visitors of the neighbourhood’. Shareholders at the time included several famous Bristolians, including Isambard Kingdom Brunel.