Shropshire Star

Watch: Telford zoo springs into Easter with whole host of cute new additions

Spring has sprung at Telford's Exotic Zoo with lambs and chicks joining their bumper litter of extra-tiny goats.

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As well as welcoming a bumper litter of bounding baby goats last month, Telford Exotic Zoo have now added a flock of new lambs and freshly hatched chicks to their farmyard family.

Ten cade lambs have joined the farm for the next few months, which means quite a few nights of interrupted sleep for the keepers.

Cade lambs are lambs that aren't being brought up by their mothers, for one reason or another.

Zoo owner, Scott Adams explained: "Usually, if the mums have three lambs, they can only look after two.

"Cade lambs can be a pain for farmers, who are too busy to be bottle-feeding lambs. We have friends that have farms, so we step in and help out until they're eating solids."

The feeding schedule means keepers will be taking turns to pop in overnight and feed the flock, with Scott having drawn bottle duty on Friday.

Exotic Zoo in Telford has welcomed ten new lambs

"I was here at 1am this morning," he said. "They're super cute, really friendly, so that helps. They're very happy to see us because we're their new mums, so they'll follow you around."

The zoo has also welcomed four chicks, who have hatched over the last couple of weeks.

Visitors over half term will be able to hold the chicks and chip in with bottle-feeding the lambs.

The latest addition joins a bumper litter of pygmy goats that were born last month, with each of the mums having twins.

Julie Doughty, Scott Adams, Mel Garton and Ryan Jordan with some of the newest additions

It means that the zoo has now got 10 pygmy goat kids, who, according to Scott, are still all extra tiny.

There's also a range of free, Easter-themed activities over the holidays for visitors to the zoo.

Children will be able to decorate plant pots for a sunflower growing competition and take part in a free Easter egg hunt.