Latest news with #SteveNichols
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Caribbean Moonshine Distillery Announces Exciting Expansion Opportunity in Florida --Licensees can now tap into a booming craft distillery market
ORLANDO, Fla., May 28, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Sunshine Cellars, parent company of the internationally award-winning Caribbean Moonshine®, is thrilled to announce a first-of-its-kind opportunity: entrepreneurs, as well as bar, restaurant and resort operators across Florida, can now own their own micro-distillery and retail outlet under the Caribbean Moonshine Distillery brand—as an official licensee. Early adopters include operators interested in expanding their existing restaurant and bars with a turnkey speakeasy concept and branded products. Following the remarkable success of the flagship Orlando location at the Orlando Vineland Premium Outlets, Caribbean Moonshine is inviting spirited entrepreneurs to join the brand's explosive growth journey. With a lineup of six irresistible rum flavors, licensees can now tap into the exceptional value of the booming craft distillery market with minimal space requirements — as little as 1,000 square feet. "Caribbean Moonshine is changing the game," says Co-Founder Steve Nichols. "We've crafted a bold new path for operators: serve, sell, and shine as a licensed Caribbean Moonshine micro-distillery." What's on offer: Access to a fast-growing, award-winning Craft Island Rum product at wholesale pricing through the purchase via transfer-in-bond. Opportunity to sell cocktails and finished bottled products through your own licensed Caribbean Moonshine micro distillery. Ability to sell on property or at local events for added customer engagement and commercial value. Referral to an experienced Florida law firm for acquisition of your Craft Distillery License. A network of like-minded entrepreneurs united by a Florida-made brand that allows 142 million vacationers to take home "The Taste of Vacation®"—turning unforgettable trips into lasting memories. Caribbean Moonshine is an award-winning craft island rum brand disrupting the traditional liquor landscape. Licensees benefit from bonded warehouse access, inventory management, excise tax tracking and reporting ensuring they're always stocked with Caribbean Moonshine's core lineup—plus innovative new offerings debuting every year. Co-Founder Mike Weber adds, "This isn't just about selling rum — it's about creating a lifestyle, a community, and a great business opportunity. We're looking for passionate individuals who want to have fun, make money, and build something truly special with us." To learn more about becoming a Caribbean Moonshine licensee in Florida, watch this video and contact us at Contact@ View original content to download multimedia: SOURCE Sunshine Cellars, LLC. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Telegraph
22-05-2025
- Automotive
- Telegraph
‘I had a front-row seat for the explosive Senna-Prost rivalry'
Thirty-seven years ago, Ayrton Senna produced a qualifying lap of such staggering speed and precision around the streets of Monte Carlo that even he found it hard to believe. The Brazilian later described his performance as 'in a different dimension… well beyond my conscious understanding'. Only a few seconds of the sublime 1min 23.998sec was captured by television cameras, but seeing the numbers in black and white is remarkable. It was not just that Senna was more than 1.4 seconds faster than his McLaren team-mate in second – it was that his team-mate was Alain Prost. In the race, it was more of the same relentless brilliance. Prost dropped to third behind Gerhard Berger off the line, but by the time he hauled his McLaren back ahead of the Ferrari and started pushing, leader Senna was 50 seconds ahead. Eleven laps from the chequered flag, the unfathomable happened. Senna crashed at Portier, the final right-hander before the tunnel. He was utterly dejected. Prost took victory, extending his championship lead over his team-mate to 15 points after three rounds. The mistake was as inexplicable as his otherworldly qualifying lap the previous day. Senna claimed that he lost concentration after being ordered by McLaren team principal Ron Dennis to ease off. One man who believes differently is Steve Nichols, Senna's race engineer at the time and who spent a decade at McLaren in the 1980s. 'As soon as he got the message on his board that it was now Prost in second place he upped his pace. He overdid it and he crashed. It was all really due to the respect he had for Prost. He knew that his arch competitor was now in second place and was going to be trying to catch him,' Nichols tells Telegraph Sport. Nichols's precise recollections of the Senna and Prost rivalry are worth listening to closely, nearly four decades on. As well as working directly with Senna, the American was also the chief designer for 1988's MP4/4, which was until 2023 the most dominant car in F1 history. It was also the machine that took Senna to his maiden title. Nichols, now 78 and out of the paddock for more than two decades, speaks with precise detail of his time in the thick of F1's most fractious and memorable periods. He recalls the first time the 27-year-old Senna came to McLaren for a seat fitting in late 1987, after joining from Lotus. 'We'd already progressed quite a bit with the car when he arrived, designing it around Prost, who was very small. Senna was a more normal size, you might say. It was a little difficult fitting him in. 'He said to me he'd been working out in Brazil over the winter and it was quite tight across the shoulders. I said 'well, maybe you could stop now!'' Delivering the MP4/4 'wonder car' In 1987 McLaren, powered by TAG-Porsche engines, had finished second in the standings with two victories but well behind champions Williams. In 1988, they began a partnership with Honda, which would bring them four double titles in a row. The introduction of the 1.5 litre, V6 turbo RA168E engine, however, delayed the MP4/4's progress. 'I didn't really want to start in earnest on the design until we knew what engine we were going to have because I wanted to fully integrate the engine into the car,' Nichols says. 'I didn't want any compromise. So I stressed the whole system. 'We arrived in Imola that year – it was the last test before the first race in Brazil. It had been an eight-day test and everybody had been there testing for seven days and we'd barely made it there in time for the last day. 'It was so intense to finish the design and so intense to get manufactured and get it to Imola. Obviously, me and my design team were trying to make it as good as it could possibly be, but I never stopped to think: 'What if it's c---?'' Nichols says. McLaren's new engine partners – who had won the previous two championships with Williams – had high expectations. 'We arrived late, about 11 o'clock at the hotel in Imola the night before. One of the higher-ups in the Honda hierarchy is just giving me this intense look and he says: 'So, tomorrow we find out about this wonder car of yours'. I thought: 'Christ, what has Ron been selling these people?' 'The next day it was a pleasant surprise, almost, that it was as fast as it was. As much as anything it was just a relief that it actually worked,' he says. The car that Senna could barely fit into went on to become the most successful in F1 history, winning 15 of 16 races that year – and 10 one-two finishes – taking the same number of pole positions. Not only was it quick, it was reliable. During a season in which rivals Benetton, Lotus and Ferrari failed to finish around one-third of their entries, the MP4/4, sleek and low to the ground, had just two mechanical retirements all season. The car scored more than three times as many points as McLaren's closest rivals, Ferrari. Prost scored more points over the season, but it was only a driver's 11 best results that counted for the championship. Senna, with eight wins to Prost's seven, took the first of his three drivers' titles for the team. 'Why do they pay you all this money?' The Monaco Grand Prix in 1988 is perhaps behind a myth that has crystallised over the past three decades – that of Senna as blisteringly quick over one lap but occasionally prone to recklessness, and of Prost as the calculated 'professor'. Nichols believes that, as aggressive as Senna was on track, this idea diminishes his total dedication. 'Senna was more flamboyant but he'd be there all hours studying all the information. I used to, once in a while, get back to the hotel late and he'd be there in a restaurant on his own having a meal and he'd have all the papers,' Nichols says. 'You've got a set-up sheet and it's got every parameter on the car, everything is adjustable. Some drivers you could look at that set-up sheet and know he's not going to change that, and that and that, so you'd fill half of it in maybe before you've even started. Then they'd spend half an hour or an hour and go through the rest of it. 'With Senna I couldn't fill anything in because he'd want to talk about every box. What is this going to do? How is it going to change? What is it going to be like on braking? What's it going to be like on turn-in? What's it going to be like mid-corner? What's it going to be on the exit?' There was, though, a clear contrast in how they drove. Nichols recalls watching Prost in qualifying for the 1985 Belgian Grand Prix, trackside at Eau Rouge. 'Prost came out and he goes through on his out-lap. It looks slow but it's his out-lap. Then he comes through again and he looks slow and I thought: 'Oh God, maybe he's got a problem'. Comes through a third time and looked slow. I thought: 'What's going on?' 'I hiked back up the hill to the pits and he was on pole. You couldn't tell the difference between an out-lap, his fast lap and an in-lap. His fast lap was so smooth, you couldn't even tell he was going fast.' Senna made the car look 'electric'. 'You thought: 'Oh my God, he's going to crash'. But he didn't. I remember in the early days of in-car cameras, at Jerez he'd qualified on pole. On the big screen – on the left they had him driving the car and on the right they had the picture of the car from the outside. 'You'd see the car around a corner, right on the edge and you'd have your heart in your mouth. Yet if you looked at the in-car stuff it was absolute serenity,' Nichols recalls. 'I said to him: 'Why do they pay you all this money? It looks like a piece of cake to me,' and he just smiled.' 'We just have to worry about the little Frenchman' The defining aspect of Nichols's time in F1, was Senna and Prost's fierce battle. Their first season together at McLaren in 1988 was not especially tempestuous, though it had its flashpoints. In 1989 the MP4/5 – now powered by naturally aspirated Honda engines – was again the class of the field. That meant either Senna would win a second championship or Prost would take his third – a recipe for tension. The rivalry became the bitterest in the sport's history, fuelled by controversy, animosity and claims of an FIA francophone conspiracy against Senna. 'In our debriefs Senna would say to me – he had the utmost respect for Prost and the other way around – 'we don't have to worry about anybody else, we just have to worry about the little Frenchman',' Nichols says. 'They worked very well together – even when they weren't talking to one another. If Prost had a question, he wouldn't ask Senna, he'd ask his race engineer and his race engineer would ask me, and I'd ask Senna and I'd tell Prost's race engineer and then he'd tell Prost!' In 1989 the relationship broke down and the rivalry reached boiling point. At round two at Imola, Prost was incensed as he believed Senna, who eventually took victory, broke an agreement not to race each other at Tosa corner. The situation was so dire that Ron Dennis held an emergency meeting with the pair at Pembrey Circuit. Worse was to come. At the penultimate round at Suzuka, the team-mates collided at the final chicane in F1's most infamous title decider, something Nichols calls 'inevitable'. Senna needed to win to keep his hopes alive and lunged up the inside. Leader Prost did not back out, the pair collided and the Frenchman retired, trudging back to the pits on foot. Senna got going again with the help of marshals and took the chequered flag first. He was then disqualified for joining the track illegally. Suzuka. More than just a circuit; an arena for some of F1's most timeless, unforgettable moments Surely, none rank higher than the skirmish between team mates Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna, and the crescendo of the 1989 title fight... #F1 #JapaneseGP — Formula 1 (@F1) March 31, 2025 'It was unfortunate, it was nasty, it was kind of what I would have expected from Prost. He's a race-car driver and he doesn't want Senna to overtake, so it's almost inevitable he's going to shut the door,' Nichols says. McLaren unsuccessfully appealed against the penalty, Prost's title was confirmed and Senna called it a 'true manipulation of the championship'. From the McLaren 'family' to Ferrari chaos Nichols moved to Ferrari in 1990, along with Prost. It was like 'leaving home'. 'I know McLaren looked kind of cold and inhospitable, but internally it was fantastic. It was really warm and wonderful on the inside. You'd go to each other's weddings and christenings and barbecues,' he says. 'In '88 I spent that year being Senna's race engineer while he won his first world championship. So leaving that was very difficult. I had a dispute with Ron over a couple of things.' One of those was the organisation of the design of future cars, which was split. Nichols wanted all the engineering 'brainpower' focused on one car. Another, lesser, reason was money. 'Ron wasn't really willing to concede on the organisational thing – one team, all the cars, me in charge, and he wouldn't concede on the money, either. Prost had asked me to go to Ferrari with him and Ferrari were willing to pay 10 times what Ron was, so it was kind of difficult to turn down.' What Nichols faced at Maranello was a world away from Woking. 'I don't know…' Nichols starts. 'Ferrari – just so much confusion and so much chaos and so much politics and so much meddling from the press. 'I'd gone there naively on my own expecting that they'd think: 'OK, he's coming from McLaren, they do almost everything perfectly, he's going to come and show us the way', but they didn't want to change,' he says. Nichols left the Scuderia in 1991, but not before another title-deciding collision between Prost and Senna at Suzuka, this time at turn one. A crash that 'tainted' Senna's title, Nichols believes. 'He didn't need to do that, he could have won the championship without crashing into Prost.' Nichols then had spells at Sauber, Jordan and then a return to McLaren, before his final job at Jaguar in 2002. His latest project is a road car under his own name – the Nichols N1A. The car takes some inspiration from the M1A, the first sports car that was designed and produced by McLaren in the mid-1960s. Fittingly, there is a run of just 15 of the N1A, one for every victory that the MP4/4 took. The name of the car, he admits, is a 'a bit near the knuckle'. Was there any trouble clearing it with his former employers? 'I've had a few discussions and they've been quite understanding. I did spend 14 or 15 years with them and delivered them a lot of success, so I think they're kind of understanding because of that.'
Yahoo
28-03-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Inside the scandal of Britain's exotic animal trade
Last month wildlife expert Steve Nichols was offered eight panthers from four different private collectors. One call was from a divorcing couple who were subsequently disbanding their collection of exotic animals. Without the space or funds to take on the cats, Nichols was forced to say no thank you. He doesn't know where they have since ended up. Such cold calls are not unusual in his line of work. Thirty years ago he founded Lincolnshire Wildlife Park after rescuing parrots from owners who no longer wanted to care for them. Today he is said to have the largest collection of African Grey parrots outside Africa. The park, which operates on a zoo licence, has always been more of a sanctuary, says Nichols; all of its animals come from individuals who can no longer look after their exotic pets. He currently has two lions, four tigers, a puma and a jaguar: the thousands of pounds needed to feed them human-grade food each year is raised through donations, tickets, annual passes and fundraisers. His reputation for taking on unwanted exotic animals has brought him into contact with some of the shadier corners of pet ownership. It would seem sensible to presume that purchasing a big cat in the UK went out with Christian the lion and the Dangerous Wild Animals Act of 1976. The story of the lion cub born in captivity, purchased from Harrods in 1969 by Australian John Rendall and his friend Anthony 'Ace' Bourke, and brought up in a Chelsea flat, is known to millions as a cavalier tale of a bygone era. What is less well known is that 50 years on from the DWA Act being introduced to discourage the fashion for interesting pets, it is perfectly legal for private collectors to own a cat as big as a lion. All you need is the approval of your local council. 'I think people will be shocked that environmental health officers from the local council carry out Dangerous Wild Animal inspections. One day they're looking at a kebab shop, then next they're looking at someone who keeps cougars and lynx. It's the same person,' says Paul O'Donoghue, director of the Lynx UK Trust. While the UK boasts some of the most rigorous zoo licensing in the world, it is a different case for private collectors. The British and Irish Association of Zoos and Aquariums (BIAZA) defines a zoo as any organisation that keeps exotic animals, is open to the public for more than seven days a year, and demonstrates a commitment to conservation, education and research. If you're not planning on displaying them then theoretically, anyone who wants to keep a wild cat – such as a bobcat, caracal, cheetah, jaguar, leopard, lion, lynx, ocelot, puma, serval or tiger – only needs a licence under the UK DWA Act. To secure a two-year Dangerous and Wild Animal licence from your local council, the accommodation must be inspected by a vet prior to a licence being issued or re-issued. 'The licences are issued by the relevant local authority who must ensure that applicants provide secure, suitable accommodation that offers adequate food, drink, bedding, exercise and protection from emergencies. It focuses mainly on health and safety – not on animal welfare,' says Dr Jo Judge, CEO of BIAZA. She says there is consensus among animal welfare organisations that the DWA is rarely adequately enforced, predominantly because local authorities are massively under-resourced. 'We support calls to improve the DWA licensing system,' says Judge. Those in the field might be painfully aware of how underregulated exotic animals are in the UK, however it was the illegal release in January of four lynx that highlighted the issue of under-the-radar species to the general public. Credit: RZSS In this case, the lynx were quickly captured. Three females, all believed to be less than a year old, are now thriving at Edinburgh Zoo; sadly, a fourth lynx died. Whether it was an irresponsible rewilding release or a deliberate abandonment of animals that had become too much of a burden is unknown. According to reports at the time there were some clues to their origins, including the discovery of straw bedding with porcupine quills in it, which suggests they came from a collection with other species. In the view of experts, they were certainly too domesticated to have survived in the wild. Derek Gow, a UK-based reintroduction expert widely credited with bringing back the beaver to our rivers, has three lynx at his conservation centre in Devon. These, he says, would be unsuitable for a guerilla rewilding release, due to being raised in captivity and the two males having been castrated. 'I keep them for education purposes really,' says Gow. In his opinion the lynx release was the result of frustration at the pace of rewilding, rather than abandonment of exotic pets. 'It's not a very clever idea, but it's the sign of a broken process.' Conservation, rewilding, status, passion for the animals; there is no single reason why someone might be motivated to build a private collection. Often in Nichols' experience it's as simple as: they want one, and they can. He also speculates whether social media is in part responsible for popularising exotic pets. 'They are a relative fashion accessory in lots of cases. Imagine being in a nightclub and telling the person you're chatting up that you've got a tiger in your back garden? It's harder to get a left-hand-drive car than it is a tiger,' he deadpans. Down the line, the cost of care or failing to meet standards might mean he gets a phone call asking for help. Nichols has been offered everything from a tiger in a cage from the back of a transit van, to a 6ft caiman that was kept in a drug dealer's bathtub. Often it is a local council that will get in touch with him to ask for assistance. 'I've been out with councils where I've seen medium-sized cats like cheetahs and leopards, which weigh about 50kg, in cages smaller than what you'd put dogs in, and the councils have given them licences for years.' It is a cold morning when we meet at his 30-acre site on the Lincolnshire fens. The enclosures of colourful parrots and furry primates look lost against the large, grey sky. Nichols has just received a phone call from a local council in Essex; a private collector has died, leaving a panther (the name for a black leopard or jaguar) in his back garden. Whether they had a DWA licence is unclear. Nichols said he was unable to help. He has no idea who the council called next. Already he has his own expensive rescues to care for and, as a charity, finances are finite. Still, no expense is spared for his charges; 17-year-old white lion brothers, Pascha and Uganda. The pair lie languidly on a heated bed of fresh straw. Uganda is the alpha, although you wouldn't guess it from his tatty mane, the result of years of testosterone blockers. Pascha greets Nichols with a stand-up roar straight into his face; it is something he was trained to do in his years working in entertainment in Europe. The boys, however, were British born and bred, before they were sold abroad. White lions, although extremely rare, are not on the critically endangered list, and so can be traded. It was the original breeder who called Nichols six years ago. The lions were now old and expensive ('Sedating a lion costs £15,000 very easily,' says Nichols) and the circus he had sold them to years ago no longer wanted them, and returned them to him. Having retired from the trade and with no one able to care for them in their dotage, Uganda and Pascha faced being put to sleep. Nichols took them in. 'He said they had 12 months left. We've now had them for five and a half years. They definitely can't go on for much longer,' says Nichols. Their health and happiness is closely monitored. Uganda might look a bit worse for wear, but, says Nichols, 'He's just always been less good-looking than his brother.' It's staggering that the trade in white lions is legal. And there are also canny ways of circumventing the sale of other animals on the critically endangered list as well. It is illegal to sell a tiger, but not illegal to pay for the overheads of a tiger cub while you're waiting for it to grow up. 'So a breeder will charge them £35,000 for care. Technically they've not bought the tiger, but they've paid for its upbringing.' None of the 130 zoos and aquariums that are members of BIAZA sells big cats. 'Animals such as big cats are not bought or sold by responsible zoos, rather coordinated through international conservation breeding programmes.'But there is no central database of the number of zoos in the UK. Previously it has been estimated that there are around 400 zoo licence holders in England and Wales. Many of these will not be calling themselves zoos, or be recognised as such by the public. So it is less clear what breeding practices occur at those 'zoos' that are not part of BIAZA's membership, and whether animals are traded. Despite the shadowy dealings that account for the origins of many of the big cats in private collections, Nichols is keen to point out that not all private collectors are by definition, bad. 'There are some brilliant private collectors. And just because it's in a private collection doesn't mean it's going to be a bad environment,' he says. 'Many of them are very wealthy and can afford the best. But there are a lot out there that aren't as good.' By many accounts Terrence Moore loved his big cats like they were his own children. As the director of the Cat Survival Trust in Welwyn, Moore had a reputation as an eccentric who gained media attention for his work. He worked alongside zoos to look after critically endangered species of cat, including the Amur leopard, considered by some to be the most endangered cat in the May he was sentenced to a five-year ban from keeping animals and charged with causing unnecessary suffering to an animal. A jury found he presided over a menagerie of neglect and mismanagement. The tale didn't stop there. In November, while waiting for the cats to be rehomed, Moore, 78, dubbed 'Britain's Tiger King' by tabloids, was rushed to hospital after being mauled by a puma. One of his legs had to be amputated. Finally, in January, the cats were rehomed by Hertfordshire Zoo and The Big Cat Sanctuary in Kent. Cameron Whitnall, project lead across both organisations, as well as a wildlife TV presenter, recalls the terrible living conditions he encountered at the Cat Survival Trust. 'They hadn't been fed properly, there was faeces that had been there for months, water dishes that were green. The cats had terrible health issues, and were not vaccinated.' Part of what was so shocking about Moore's case was that he had received all the required local authority vet checks over the years. He was considered a good owner and the issues only came to light as a result of volunteers' whistleblowing. 'It was one of the most dangerous sites we've ever worked on,' says Whitnall. 'We were lucky that nothing worse happened than Terrence being attacked and having to have his leg amputated.' In Whitnall's opinion an urgent conversation needs to be opened up about how private collectors like Moore receive their licences. 'A DWA is simpler to obtain than a zoo licence. It's not that complex or stringent and unfortunately animals will fall into the wrong hands. Some people might have the best intentions but they're executing those intentions in the wrong way. It's a really dark world and it needs fixing quickly.' The scale of the issue in the UK is unclear. Figures for the total number of DWA licences for big cats are not in the public domain currently and are held by individual councils around the country. Nichols personally believes the market isn't huge. 'We're not talking hundreds of people. I would say about 30 to 45 licences, and about 200 big cats. But one is probably too many, if it's not done correctly.' Whitnall is less restrained in his appraisal of the situation: 'There are so many like Terrence out there.' Boxing Day, 2017, and wet weather near the village of Great Treverran, south-east Cornwall, causes a particularly exotic pet to go walkabout. For six days a leopard from the private collection of Todd Dalton was on the loose. By the time it was finally trapped by a farmer it had killed one sheep and injured others that had to be put down due to their injuries. Villagers had no clue of the escape until after the leopard was captured a mile away from its enclosure. Dalton was already a familiar figure in the world of big cats, coming to media attention in 2006 as the 'Leopard Man of Peckham' after securing a permit to breed leopards in his back garden. Until 2015 he ran the Rare Species Conservation Centre in Kent before moving to Cornwall, where he applied for a DWA the aftermath of the escape, Dalton apologised to the villagers of Great Treverran, and explained that the clouded leopard only escaped because of unforeseen flooding that liquified and washed out mud on the perimeter of the enclosure. How often similar such escapes occur in private collections is unknown. The British Big Cats Society receives between 500 and 600 reports of big cats a year. While there has long been speculation about cats living wild in the UK, could such sightings be escaped ones? I have reluctantly become one of the multitude of uneasy believers in wild big cats in the UK. Last year while driving along the A303 I saw what could only be described as a big cat, the colouring of a puma, slinking its way along the verge. While Whitnall says such accounts are as provable as UFO sightings, there was an instance 15 years ago when he followed up reports of a lynx sighting and did indeed manage to find evidence of a lynx paw print. 'But overall sightings are hard to credit,' he says. The International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), a global non-profit organisation that works to improve the welfare of animals and people, is all too aware of the occasional stories about big cat sightings. They agree that the exotic pet trade is still a problem. 'It often happens that people realise that the cute cub they thought would be a nice pet is actually a wild animal and will display certain instincts and behaviours over time. Their care – in terms of food, enrichment and veterinary services – is expensive. People are often unable or unwilling to invest that much money, so they feed the animal with unsuitable feed, will skip veterinary check-ups, and keep the animals in unsuitable living conditions. This seriously affects the health and well-being of the animal. When people find they can't cope any more, we hope that they will then contact a local wildlife rescue centre or sanctuary to hand over the animal, but they might try to sell it or indeed abandon it.' The IFAW has just completed a project with Whitnall to rescue five lions from Ukraine. 'Everyone asks if they were from a zoo,' says Whitnall. 'No, they were from the illegal pet trade.' One of the lions was being kept in a flat. Others on concrete floors. Whitnall is in no doubt that if the war had not happened it would never have been exposed. 'And they may have made their way to the UK.' While some big cats certainly may be smuggled into this country, the majority are most likely the product of unscrupulous breeding and behind-doors sales within the UK. In Nichols' experience councils do not ask enough questions about the origins of the animals they issue licences for. One thing is certain, the legislation needs refreshing. 'DWA needs improving. Everyone points the finger at people in Dubai with pet tigers, but it's happening on our doorstep and nobody has a clue,' says Whitnall. 'We're failing cats and animals because of it. Everyone in the industry recognises it, now we need to put our heads together and sort it out.' Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
Telegraph
28-03-2025
- General
- Telegraph
Inside the scandal of Britain's exotic animal trade
Last month wildlife expert Steve Nichols was offered eight panthers from four different private collectors. One call was from a divorcing couple who were subsequently disbanding their collection of exotic animals. Without the space or funds to take on the cats, Nichols was forced to say no thank you. He doesn't know where they have since ended up. Such cold calls are not unusual in his line of work. Thirty years ago he founded Lincolnshire Wildlife Park after rescuing parrots from owners who no longer wanted to care for them. Today he is said to have the largest collection of African Grey parrots outside Africa. The park, which operates on a zoo licence, has always been more of a sanctuary, says Nichols; all of its animals come from individuals who can no longer look after their exotic pets. He currently has two lions, four tigers, a puma and a jaguar: the thousands of pounds needed to feed them human-grade food each year is raised through donations, tickets, annual passes and fundraisers. His reputation for taking on unwanted exotic animals has brought him into contact with some of the shadier corners of pet ownership. It would seem sensible to presume that purchasing a big cat in the UK went out with Christian the lion and the Dangerous Wild Animals Act of 1976. The story of the lion cub born in captivity, purchased from Harrods in 1969 by Australian John Rendall and his friend Anthony 'Ace' Bourke, and brought up in a Chelsea flat, is known to millions as a cavalier tale of a bygone era. What is less well known is that 50 years on from the DWA Act being introduced to discourage the fashion for interesting pets, it is perfectly legal for private collectors to own a cat as big as a lion. All you need is the approval of your local council. 'I think people will be shocked that environmental health officers from the local council carry out Dangerous Wild Animal inspections. One day they're looking at a kebab shop, then next they're looking at someone who keeps cougars and lynx. It's the same person,' says Paul O'Donoghue, director of the Lynx UK Trust. While the UK boasts some of the most rigorous zoo licensing in the world, it is a different case for private collectors. The British and Irish Association of Zoos and Aquariums (BIAZA) defines a zoo as any organisation that keeps exotic animals, is open to the public for more than seven days a year, and demonstrates a commitment to conservation, education and research. If you're not planning on displaying them then theoretically, anyone who wants to keep a wild cat – such as a bobcat, caracal, cheetah, jaguar, leopard, lion, lynx, ocelot, puma, serval or tiger – only needs a licence under the UK DWA Act. To secure a two-year Dangerous and Wild Animal licence from your local council, the accommodation must be inspected by a vet prior to a licence being issued or re-issued. 'The licences are issued by the relevant local authority who must ensure that applicants provide secure, suitable accommodation that offers adequate food, drink, bedding, exercise and protection from emergencies. It focuses mainly on health and safety – not on animal welfare,' says Dr Jo Judge, CEO of BIAZA. She says there is consensus among animal welfare organisations that the DWA is rarely adequately enforced, predominantly because local authorities are massively under-resourced. 'We support calls to improve the DWA licensing system,' says Judge. Those in the field might be painfully aware of how underregulated exotic animals are in the UK, however it was the illegal release in January of four lynx that highlighted the issue of under-the-radar species to the general public. In this case, the lynx were quickly captured. Three females, all believed to be less than a year old, are now thriving at Edinburgh Zoo; sadly, a fourth lynx died. Whether it was an irresponsible rewilding release or a deliberate abandonment of animals that had become too much of a burden is unknown. According to reports at the time there were some clues to their origins, including the discovery of straw bedding with porcupine quills in it, which suggests they came from a collection with other species. In the view of experts, they were certainly too domesticated to have survived in the wild. Derek Gow, a UK-based reintroduction expert widely credited with bringing back the beaver to our rivers, has three lynx at his conservation centre in Devon. These, he says, would be unsuitable for a guerilla rewilding release, due to being raised in captivity and the two males having been castrated. 'I keep them for education purposes really,' says Gow. In his opinion the lynx release was the result of frustration at the pace of rewilding, rather than abandonment of exotic pets. 'It's not a very clever idea, but it's the sign of a broken process.' Conservation, rewilding, status, passion for the animals; there is no single reason why someone might be motivated to build a private collection. Often in Nichols' experience it's as simple as: they want one, and they can. He also speculates whether social media is in part responsible for popularising exotic pets. 'They are a relative fashion accessory in lots of cases. Imagine being in a nightclub and telling the person you're chatting up that you've got a tiger in your back garden? It's harder to get a left-hand-drive car than it is a tiger,' he deadpans. Down the line, the cost of care or failing to meet standards might mean he gets a phone call asking for help. Nichols has been offered everything from a tiger in a cage from the back of a transit van, to a 6ft caiman that was kept in a drug dealer's bathtub. Often it is a local council that will get in touch with him to ask for assistance. 'I've been out with councils where I've seen medium-sized cats like cheetahs and leopards, which weigh about 50kg, in cages smaller than what you'd put dogs in, and the councils have given them licences for years.' It is a cold morning when we meet at his 30-acre site on the Lincolnshire fens. The enclosures of colourful parrots and furry primates look lost against the large, grey sky. Nichols has just received a phone call from a local council in Essex; a private collector has died, leaving a panther (the name for a black leopard or jaguar) in his back garden. Whether they had a DWA licence is unclear. Nichols said he was unable to help. He has no idea who the council called next. Already he has his own expensive rescues to care for and, as a charity, finances are finite. Still, no expense is spared for his charges; 17-year-old white lion brothers, Pascha and Uganda. The pair lie languidly on a heated bed of fresh straw. Uganda is the alpha, although you wouldn't guess it from his tatty mane, the result of years of testosterone blockers. Pascha greets Nichols with a stand-up roar straight into his face; it is something he was trained to do in his years working in entertainment in Europe. The boys, however, were British born and bred, before they were sold abroad. White lions, although extremely rare, are not on the critically endangered list, and so can be traded. It was the original breeder who called Nichols six years ago. The lions were now old and expensive ('Sedating a lion costs £15,000 very easily,' says Nichols) and the circus he had sold them to years ago no longer wanted them, and returned them to him. Having retired from the trade and with no one able to care for them in their dotage, Uganda and Pascha faced being put to sleep. Nichols took them in. 'He said they had 12 months left. We've now had them for five and a half years. They definitely can't go on for much longer,' says Nichols. Their health and happiness is closely monitored. Uganda might look a bit worse for wear, but, says Nichols, 'He's just always been less good-looking than his brother.' It's staggering that the trade in white lions is legal. And there are also canny ways of circumventing the sale of other animals on the critically endangered list as well. It is illegal to sell a tiger, but not illegal to pay for the overheads of a tiger cub while you're waiting for it to grow up. 'So a breeder will charge them £35,000 for care. Technically they've not bought the tiger, but they've paid for its upbringing.' None of the 130 zoos and aquariums that are members of BIAZA sells big cats. 'Animals such as big cats are not bought or sold by responsible zoos, rather coordinated through international conservation breeding programmes.' But there is no central database of the number of zoos in the UK. Previously it has been estimated that there are around 400 zoo licence holders in England and Wales. Many of these will not be calling themselves zoos, or be recognised as such by the public. So it is less clear what breeding practices occur at those 'zoos' that are not part of BIAZA's membership, and whether animals are traded. Despite the shadowy dealings that account for the origins of many of the big cats in private collections, Nichols is keen to point out that not all private collectors are by definition, bad. 'There are some brilliant private collectors. And just because it's in a private collection doesn't mean it's going to be a bad environment,' he says. 'Many of them are very wealthy and can afford the best. But there are a lot out there that aren't as good.' By many accounts Terrence Moore loved his big cats like they were his own children. As the director of the Cat Survival Trust in Welwyn, Moore had a reputation as an eccentric who gained media attention for his work. He worked alongside zoos to look after critically endangered species of cat, including the Amur leopard, considered by some to be the most endangered cat in the world. Last May he was sentenced to a five-year ban from keeping animals and charged with causing unnecessary suffering to an animal. A jury found he presided over a menagerie of neglect and mismanagement. The tale didn't stop there. In November, while waiting for the cats to be rehomed, Moore, 78, dubbed 'Britain's Tiger King' by tabloids, was rushed to hospital after being mauled by a puma. One of his legs had to be amputated. Finally, in January, the cats were rehomed by Hertfordshire Zoo and The Big Cat Sanctuary in Kent. Cameron Whitnall, project lead across both organisations, as well as a wildlife TV presenter, recalls the terrible living conditions he encountered at the Cat Survival Trust. 'They hadn't been fed properly, there was faeces that had been there for months, water dishes that were green. The cats had terrible health issues, and were not vaccinated.' Part of what was so shocking about Moore's case was that he had received all the required local authority vet checks over the years. He was considered a good owner and the issues only came to light as a result of volunteers' whistleblowing. 'It was one of the most dangerous sites we've ever worked on,' says Whitnall. 'We were lucky that nothing worse happened than Terrence being attacked and having to have his leg amputated.' In Whitnall's opinion an urgent conversation needs to be opened up about how private collectors like Moore receive their licences. 'A DWA is simpler to obtain than a zoo licence. It's not that complex or stringent and unfortunately animals will fall into the wrong hands. Some people might have the best intentions but they're executing those intentions in the wrong way. It's a really dark world and it needs fixing quickly.' The scale of the issue in the UK is unclear. Figures for the total number of DWA licences for big cats are not in the public domain currently and are held by individual councils around the country. Nichols personally believes the market isn't huge. 'We're not talking hundreds of people. I would say about 30 to 45 licences, and about 200 big cats. But one is probably too many, if it's not done correctly.' Whitnall is less restrained in his appraisal of the situation: 'There are so many like Terrence out there.' Boxing Day, 2017, and wet weather near the village of Great Treverran, south-east Cornwall, causes a particularly exotic pet to go walkabout. For six days a leopard from the private collection of Todd Dalton was on the loose. By the time it was finally trapped by a farmer it had killed one sheep and injured others that had to be put down due to their injuries. Villagers had no clue of the escape until after the leopard was captured a mile away from its enclosure. Dalton was already a familiar figure in the world of big cats, coming to media attention in 2006 as the 'Leopard Man of Peckham' after securing a permit to breed leopards in his back garden. Until 2015 he ran the Rare Species Conservation Centre in Kent before moving to Cornwall, where he applied for a DWA the aftermath of the escape, Dalton apologised to the villagers of Great Treverran, and explained that the clouded leopard only escaped because of unforeseen flooding that liquified and washed out mud on the perimeter of the enclosure. How often similar such escapes occur in private collections is unknown. The British Big Cats Society receives between 500 and 600 reports of big cats a year. While there has long been speculation about cats living wild in the UK, could such sightings be escaped ones? I have reluctantly become one of the multitude of uneasy believers in wild big cats in the UK. Last year while driving along the A303 I saw what could only be described as a big cat, the colouring of a puma, slinking its way along the verge. While Whitnall says such accounts are as provable as UFO sightings, there was an instance 15 years ago when he followed up reports of a lynx sighting and did indeed manage to find evidence of a lynx paw print. 'But overall sightings are hard to credit,' he says. The International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), a global non-profit organisation that works to improve the welfare of animals and people, is all too aware of the occasional stories about big cat sightings. They agree that the exotic pet trade is still a problem. 'It often happens that people realise that the cute cub they thought would be a nice pet is actually a wild animal and will display certain instincts and behaviours over time. Their care – in terms of food, enrichment and veterinary services – is expensive. People are often unable or unwilling to invest that much money, so they feed the animal with unsuitable feed, will skip veterinary check-ups, and keep the animals in unsuitable living conditions. This seriously affects the health and well-being of the animal. When people find they can't cope any more, we hope that they will then contact a local wildlife rescue centre or sanctuary to hand over the animal, but they might try to sell it or indeed abandon it.' The IFAW has just completed a project with Whitnall to rescue five lions from Ukraine. 'Everyone asks if they were from a zoo,' says Whitnall. 'No, they were from the illegal pet trade.' One of the lions was being kept in a flat. Others on concrete floors. Whitnall is in no doubt that if the war had not happened it would never have been exposed. 'And they may have made their way to the UK.' While some big cats certainly may be smuggled into this country, the majority are most likely the product of unscrupulous breeding and behind-doors sales within the UK. In Nichols' experience councils do not ask enough questions about the origins of the animals they issue licences for. One thing is certain, the legislation needs refreshing. 'DWA needs improving. Everyone points the finger at people in Dubai with pet tigers, but it's happening on our doorstep and nobody has a clue,' says Whitnall. 'We're failing cats and animals because of it. Everyone in the industry recognises it, now we need to put our heads together and sort it out.'
