Marwell's gibbon family to get a royal visitor (From Daily Echo)

Marwell's gibbon family to get a royal visitor

8:00am Saturday 15th September 2007 in News By Will Carson

THEY may have just moved to a new home, but Marwell Zoo's family of Siamang gibbons will have to be on their best behaviour when they are visited by royalty.

HRH The Princess Royal will visit the four cheeky monkeys when she officially opens the zoo's new Life in the Trees exhibit.

At 5,000 sq m the Siamang's new home boasts an array of mod cons such an abundance of vines in the back garden so that mum Simone, dad Luang and sons ten-year-old Hale Bop and five-year-old Rosh, can swing around with ease.

The £30,000 landscaped garden with exotic plants and vegetation will leave vegetarian neighbours such as the Dorcas gazelles green with envy.

The new Life in the Trees' enclosure gives visitors to Marwell the chance to get breathtakingly close to the energetic apes.

Luang, regarded by many as Marwell's noisiest animal, now has a large tree where he can display his authority by singing songs from the summit for all and sundry to enjoy.

HRH The Princess Royal will open the Life in Trees exhibit at 2pm on Monday.

To see the gibbons, log onto the Echo Video News section of this website.

The new home brings a little bit of South East Asia to Hampshire and the exhibit includes many plants - from ferns and grasses to bamboo - which the gibbons would eat in their natural habitat.