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Speaker 1: And now there has been quite a bit of discussion

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Speaker 1: in recent days, you'd have to say about the Territory

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Speaker 1: Wildlife Park and claims by the Country Liberal Party that

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Speaker 1: the current government is looking at selling it off and

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Speaker 1: making changes out there which would eventually see it either

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Speaker 1: sold or moved. Now joining me on the line is

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Speaker 1: a former zoo keeper, as I understand it, out there

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Speaker 1: at the Territory Wildlife Park, Greg Mayo is his name.

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Speaker 1: Good morning to you, Greg.

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Speaker 2: Good morning, good morning to you.

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Speaker 1: Listen, Greg, thank you very much for your time this morning.

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Speaker 1: I understand that you worked out at the Territory Wildlife

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Speaker 1: Park well for quite a long time.

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Speaker 2: Yes, twenty twenty years. I retired two years ago, but

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Speaker 2: certainly a big chunk of my life was a Territory

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Speaker 2: Wildlife Park.

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Speaker 1: Mate, what are your concerns at the moment or you know,

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Speaker 1: what do you think is happening at the moment? Is

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Speaker 1: this political game playing or are there serious concerns about

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Speaker 1: changes out there at the Territory Wildlife Park.

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Speaker 2: As far as the park is concerned, it's about it changes.

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Speaker 2: The Territory Wildlife Park has really struggled to be effectively

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Speaker 2: budgeted for at least the last fourteen years. I can't

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Speaker 2: speak about last two years accurately, but certainly before then,

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Speaker 2: every year we would have a budget allocation and because

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Speaker 2: of the size of the operation and the significant staff

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Speaker 2: would put that's required, it was very hard to ever

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Speaker 2: meet budget, and conpark managers tried very hard to meet budget,

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Speaker 2: but it was always topped up. But what's happened is

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Speaker 2: it's never, as far as I know, Treasury has never

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Speaker 2: effectively looked at the cost of running the Territory Wildlife

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Speaker 2: Park and actually given it a suitable budget. So for

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Speaker 2: fourteen years the budget hasn't changed. Now, there can't be

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Speaker 2: too many organizations in the country with staff costs going

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Speaker 2: up slightly certainly consumables and contractors prices all going up

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Speaker 2: to still be able to meet a same budget in

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Speaker 2: fourteen years. And so then when I've heard that they

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Speaker 2: were shutting down significant part of the park, I thought

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Speaker 2: the community needs to know about this because there is

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Speaker 2: a huge amount of community support for the Territory Wildlife Park.

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Speaker 2: People feel it as their own. You know, there's a

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Speaker 2: yearly path available so people can pay once and then

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Speaker 2: they come and visit. And over the years that people

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Speaker 2: would come ten fifteen twenty times a year just to

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Speaker 2: enjoy a certain part of the park.

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Speaker 1: Great and so greg from your perspective, what changes are

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Speaker 1: underway at the moment.

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Speaker 2: What I've been caught is there's several areas that are

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Speaker 2: going to be closing. The Buffalo Trail. An interesting thing

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Speaker 2: about the Buffalo Trail is about three between three and

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Speaker 2: four years ago, significant investment was put into upgrade it

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Speaker 2: because historically it had been closed before for budget cups,

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Speaker 2: and there was a huge effort to return it because

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Speaker 2: they felt buffalo was such an iconic animal at the

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Speaker 2: top end, even though they're introduced, people love to see buffalos.

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Speaker 2: So that's been closed and I think it was somewhere

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Speaker 2: around one hundred and fifty thousand dollars was spent on

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Speaker 2: that exhibit, say around four years ago. Wow, the Rocky

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Speaker 2: Ridges and other area that's closed. It's a large rock

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Speaker 2: mountain that has the news, although I may have heard

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Speaker 2: from somebody else that they've actually gone already. And some

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Speaker 2: black waller rooes, which is actually the only place in

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Speaker 2: the world that you can see black walllerories. It's one

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Speaker 2: of our iconic macropod species. It's endemic just to the

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Speaker 2: Northern Territory. INGOs is also closing, you know, certainly an

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Speaker 2: iconic animal of Australia, and the one that concerns me

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Speaker 2: most though because of my association with it, is the

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Speaker 2: entire monsoon forest. Now that includes eleven walk past Avery's

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Speaker 2: which are world class. There Averies are built thirty years

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Speaker 2: ago and they still are world class. They've got elevated

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Speaker 2: floor last viewing people can see the birds that are

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Speaker 2: great view. It's sheltered so they're out of the sun

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Speaker 2: and par After you walk past those eleven averys, you

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Speaker 2: enter a huge dome Monsoon Avery, which as I understand,

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Speaker 2: is actually the largest in the Southern Hemisphere. And inside

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Speaker 2: that Avery, which is about twenty meters high and fifty

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Speaker 2: meters in diameter, there will get an experience of being

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Speaker 2: in the monsoon forest with all the birds that live

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Speaker 2: in the monsoon forest. But once you leave that avery,

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Speaker 2: you've got seven hundred and fifty meters of elevated boardwalk

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Speaker 2: which takes you through a patch of monsoon forest. And

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Speaker 2: Mom's Forest is so important. It's actually the only habitat

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Speaker 2: that is specific to the top ends. So northern Northern

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Speaker 2: Territory in northwestern Australia. The other habitats that have depicted

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Speaker 2: wetlands and they're found in many other areas of Australia,

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Speaker 2: and also tropical savanna which is found right across the

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Speaker 2: top of Australia. Though monsoon forest is the most specific

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Speaker 2: habitat that should be so important to be interpreted up

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Speaker 2: here in the Northern Territory.

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Speaker 1: Great, what's going to happen with all of those birds

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Speaker 1: in that monsoon forest?

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Speaker 2: Listen? So there's certainly techniques in zoological institutions to dispose

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Speaker 2: of surplus birds, but we're talking potentially several hundred birds

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Speaker 2: now the first instance, that normally offer to other zoological

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Speaker 2: institutions around the country, and some of them will probably

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Speaker 2: be taken up there. There may be some that are

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Speaker 2: considered possible for release and that will be the best

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Speaker 2: options for that hat to happen.

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Speaker 1: But so could some of these birds be put down?

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Speaker 2: Listen? I don't know. I'm not sort of involved in

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Speaker 2: that management part of the park anymore, obviously, and certainly

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Speaker 2: that would be an absolute last resort. The people there

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Speaker 2: love their animals. Territory Wildlife Park is like a family,

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Speaker 2: and certainly with a family to meet for twenty years

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Speaker 2: and even when they pop in every now and again.

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Speaker 2: Now the people want to have a chat to you know,

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Speaker 2: it's a real family and they're so dedicated to delivering

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Speaker 2: a quality experience for the visitors, from the guides to

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Speaker 2: the zoo keepers that apparently a lot of the talks

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Speaker 2: have been cut back to and that was one of

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Speaker 2: the things that made Territory Wildlife Parks so different to

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Speaker 2: most other parks in the country. They love to engage

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Speaker 2: with visitors and I'm sure you've been there over the years,

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Speaker 2: Katia and then enjoyed some of those presentations and people

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Speaker 2: for really important when a keeper or a guy is

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Speaker 2: standing there talking to them and making them feel special.

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Speaker 2: And the keepers and guys love interpreting their animals. They

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Speaker 2: want to tell them everything special about these animals.

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Speaker 1: Great. That must make you feel incredibly sad that it's

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Speaker 1: changing in this way, and like you said, it is

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Speaker 1: a real territory icon.

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Speaker 2: This is absolutely Katie, and that's why I've come forward,

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Speaker 2: and you know, I'm not bound. Unfortunately, the people at

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Speaker 2: the Wildlife park are and been gagged if they can't

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Speaker 2: say anything. I feel very passionate about the Wildlife Park.

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Speaker 2: I gave twenty twenty of my years to it. I've

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Speaker 2: been in the zoo industry for forty years. I'm rarely

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Speaker 2: experienced in it, and to do the last twenty years

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Speaker 2: a Territory Wildlife Park, it was a culmination of a

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Speaker 2: very enjoyable work life.

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Speaker 1: I am going to have to get ready to wrap up, greg,

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Speaker 1: but I know that the Northern Territory government has allocated

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Speaker 1: five point four one two million to the Territory Wildlife

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Speaker 1: Park in the twenty twenty one twenty twenty two budget.

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Speaker 1: Is that enough?

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Speaker 2: Absolutely not. This is what you've got as a park

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Speaker 2: that's thirty years old, so a lot of the infrastructure

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Speaker 2: like air conditioners and that type of thinging. They're starting

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Speaker 2: to see the end of their life, maybe even to

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Speaker 2: the second time in their life. And in order to

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Speaker 2: I've been in the zoo industry for a long time

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Speaker 2: now with zoos, what they need to do is they

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Speaker 2: need to bring on a major exhibit about every two years.

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Speaker 2: This is well documented in the zoo world, and about

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Speaker 2: every year they should be doing two or three major upgrades.

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Speaker 2: Long time since sinner things happen. The Territory Wildlife Park

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Speaker 2: shoots well above its weight the reality because they have

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Speaker 2: a very limited budget and people they scround. They do

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Speaker 2: everything to try and make it the best possible thing

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Speaker 2: they can. But it's time for the government to look

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Speaker 2: seriously at what a cost to run the Territory Wildlife

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Speaker 2: Park effectively, and by shutting a third of the past

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Speaker 2: is not the way to do it. I sort of

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Speaker 2: thought if they were more proactive and said listen, we're

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Speaker 2: going to do this, this, this, this at the park,

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Speaker 2: you know, and fixing up tall at blocks and pars

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Speaker 2: and that type of thing is important, but that doesn't

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Speaker 2: bring visitors in. They're worrying about getting more visitors, but

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Speaker 2: what brings visitors in is bringing on a major new

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Speaker 2: exhibit and not shutting them down. And you know, the

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Speaker 2: Monsigne Forests, I know for a fact there's actually still

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Speaker 2: in a good state of repair. It doesn't need a

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Speaker 2: lot of work. There's a few trees that need to

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Speaker 2: be removed for the safety of the visitors walking along

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Speaker 2: the path. But the reality is all the facilities were

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Speaker 2: built very sound years ago when they were built, and

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Speaker 2: it's still in a good state of repair. And that's

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Speaker 2: how they need to do it. They need to the

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Speaker 2: proper funding yep. To fund it.

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Speaker 1: Well, Greg Mayo, we are going to have to leave

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Speaker 1: it there, mate. I really appreciate you having a chat

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Speaker 1: with us this morning. I think that it is absolutely

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Speaker 1: essential that Territorians know exactly what's going on and the

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Speaker 1: fact that it does sound as though it is underfunded,

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Speaker 1: and also you know, the closure of some of these

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Speaker 1: phenomenal exhibits and areas that so many people listening this

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Speaker 1: morning will have such fond memories of. I think it's

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Speaker 1: really important that you've come forward and had that discussion.

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Speaker 2: Yep. And what we need is the community out there.

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Speaker 2: The community've always strongly supported the Territory Wildlife Park. Well,

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Speaker 2: here's the time where they really need to step up,

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Speaker 2: so you know, talk to the people you need to

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Speaker 2: talk to make sure that this doesn't happen. And Territory

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Speaker 2: Wildlife Park, it's a funding it deserves to become once again.

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Speaker 2: All still is the iconic terrorist attraction of the Company

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Speaker 2: of the Northern Territory.

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Speaker 1: Greg Mayo, thank you so much for your time this morning.

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Speaker 1: We'll talk to you again soon.

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Speaker 2: A pleasure, Katie, thank you, thank you.

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Speaker 1: That's Greg Mayo. There a former zoo keeper out there

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Speaker 1: at the territory wild Live Park Well for twenty years,