Mee and his family continued with the project, and just months after Katherine’s death, the zoo opened for its first visitors. She passed away in March of 2007, at the age of just 40. They knew it was possible it would come back, and just after Christmas 2006, they found out Katherine was dying. When the family moved into the zoo, Mee’s wife Katherine had been in remission from a brain tumor found two years earlier. They managed to raise the funds to restore the zoo.
We also had vervet monkeys (who were fighting), several emu, some deer, a llama, a small reptile collection, including some large boa constrictors, and a tarantula.”Įscaped animals, permits, needed repairs, and no money to pay for it all kept the family busy right from the start. Surrounding their new home were their new neighbors, “five Siberian tigers, three African lions, nine wolves, three big brown European bears, two pumas, a lynx, four Asian short-clawed otters, two flamingos, quite a lot of owls and a Brazilian tapir called Ronnie. Once grand, it was now in desperate need of repair. And this time all the animals would have to be shot if a buyer wasn’t found in the next few weeks.”Īfter dealing with bankers and lawyers and one family member who opposed the idea (and filed a lawsuit), on October 20, 2006, Mee, his 76-year-old mother, his wife Katherine, their children, Milo, aged six, and Ella, four, and Mee’s brother Duncan moved into the 12 bedroom mansion. The two days we spent there stayed with me, until one day, almost a year later, I saw that the zoo was up for sale again. The park sat on the edge of Dartmoor, and all around were the lush woodland and beautiful beaches of South Hams. “It wasn’t just the idea of the zoo that had captured our imaginations it was the whole area. We went back to our lives only slightly wistfully, thinking it had been an impossible dream all along. On the designated bidding day our offer was rejected on the basis that we had no real money to invest and no experience of running a zoo. “We made an appointment to view and were shown around with other prospective buyers – mainly leisure industry professionals. He writes in an article for The Guardian, published Saturday June 23, 2007:
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