Keeper Educational Exchange Programme - KEEP

Keeper Educational Exchange Programme - KEEP A tool for zookeepers to gain and share knowledge in the pursuit of optimal animal welfare.

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉The West Section team at Noah's Ark Zoo Farm are excited to offer an amazing 3 day opportunity to w...
21/08/2026

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉

The West Section team at Noah's Ark Zoo Farm are excited to offer an amazing 3 day opportunity to work with their fantastic range of species!
The team work with a fantastic range of animals including Andean Bears, African Lion, Tigers, Lowland Tapir and Giant Anteaters!

This incredible opportunity will give someone the chance to see up close how the team care for these individuals, which could potentially include cleaning and general husbandry of enclosures, enrichment, training and food preparation (which may include light butchery too).

To work with these fantastic animals whilst working with their dedicated and experienced keepers, register with us, submit your cv and cover letter and get your application in!
When applying please specify if you have any specific interests or dates that work . The successful candidate can discuss a date for the placement - it will be 3 consecutive days in November either; 9-11th November or 23rd-25th November 2026.

*Minimum experience requirement is 1 year of full time animal keeping experience in the UK and Ireland. *
🐻🐅🦁
Deadline for application is 30/09/2026
Placement dates: 9-11th November or 23rd-25th November 2026.
https://www.keeperexchange.org/vacancy/keeper-placement-west-section-noahs-ark-zoo-farm/

🥳KEEP PLACEMENT SUCCESS!🥳The team at the Deep welcomed Kaitlyn from Blue Planet Aquarium Newquay Zoo for a 2 day placeme...
19/08/2026

🥳KEEP PLACEMENT SUCCESS!🥳
The team at the Deep welcomed Kaitlyn from Blue Planet Aquarium Newquay Zoo for a 2 day placement with their wonderful keepers and animals!

Kaitlyn said;
"My placement was absolutely brilliant, I learnt loads and it was wonderful to see how they ran things at the Deep. I can't wait to bring back what I've learnt to the team!"

We want to say a huge thank you to the Deep for being fantastic and welcoming hosts whilst sharing your knowledge and expertise and big thanks to Kaitlyn for signing up, taking part and getting stuck in! 🤩

Don't forget, if you're currently a Zookeeper with over a year's paid experience, you're eligible for the programme! To register now, head to www.keeperexchange.org - you never know where you may end up!

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉- LESS THAN A WEEK TO APPLY! The gorilla team at Howletts Wild Animal Park are excited to offer an ...
10/08/2026

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉- LESS THAN A WEEK TO APPLY!

The gorilla team at Howletts Wild Animal Park are excited to offer an amazing opportunity to work with their massive collection of western lowland gorillas - 4 family groups!
The Gorilla Section is a busy section split between 2 gorilla houses, each housing 2 family groups, ranging in age from 1 year to 53 years old. The successful applicant will experience many aspects of caring for and managing the gorillas we look after. This will include but is not exclusive to: feeding, preparing medication, cleaning, training and enrichment as well as being a unique opportunity to get to know and understand a wide variety of gorilla personalities.
To work with these fantastic animals whilst working with their dedicated and experienced keepers, register with us, submit your cv and cover letter and get your application in!
If you are interested, please apply with your CV and cover letter and advise if you have any specific interests. There is potential to adjust date of placement once candidate has been selected.
*Minimum experience requirement is 1 year of full time animal keeping experience in the UK and Ireland. *
🦍🦍🦍
Deadline for application is 16/08/2026
Placement dates: 2-5 consecutive days during September 2026
https://www.keeperexchange.org/vacancy/gorilla-keeper-3/

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉- LESS THAN A WEEK TO APPLYThe hoof-stock team at Howletts Wild Animal Park are excited to offer a ...
10/08/2026

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉- LESS THAN A WEEK TO APPLY

The hoof-stock team at Howletts Wild Animal Park are excited to offer a 2 day placement on their fascinating section! This is a brilliant opportunity to work with an exciting range of species including Black Rhino, Bongo, red river hogs, Sable, Kudu, Giant Anteaters, Cape Buffalo and more! During the placement you’ll get hands on experience caring for these wonderful animals, including but not exclusive to participating in different behaviour conditioning sessions, feed/ browse preparation and herd management.

The placement would benefit someone looking to gain experience working with a large variety of hoof-stock and/ or develop their hoof-stock care skills.
To work with these fantastic animals whilst working with their dedicated and experienced keepers, register with us and get your application in!
If you are interested, please apply with your CV and cover letter and advise if you have any specific interests. There is potential to adjust date of placement once candidate has been selected.
*Minimum experience requirement is 1 year of full time animal keeping experience in the UK and Ireland. *
🦌🫎🦃
Deadline for application is 16/08/2026
Placement dates:2 consecutive days between 16th and 30th September 2026
https://www.keeperexchange.org/vacancy/hoof-stock-keeper-2/

📸Cover photo competition time! 📸- Competition winner! We recently ran a photography competition to be our latest cover p...
09/08/2026

📸Cover photo competition time! 📸- Competition winner!

We recently ran a photography competition to be our latest cover photo in collaboration with our pals ShareSavvy to showcase animals you guys care for but in a responsible way!

We're excited to announce the winner is Frank Rønsholt for his stunning shot of a polar bear underwater! Well done Frank and thanks to everyone who took part - all entries were great and passed the sharesavvy test - we'd like to think that all imagery with polar bears would pass that test for the safety of everyone involved!

We will be announcing another cover photo competition soon so get snapping!

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉We're excited to announce a fantastic shadowing opportunity with our friends and colleaborators -...
04/08/2026

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉

We're excited to announce a fantastic shadowing opportunity with our friends and colleaborators - UK Animal Care Technicians - for the chance for an animal care college technician to spend the day shadowing keepers at Hadlow College!

📍 Location: Hadlow College, Kent
📅 Dates available: 2nd – 6th November 2026 (1-day placement)
Spend the day shadowing a Technical Instructor in Animal Management, gaining hands-on insight into:
✔️ Supervising students during daily husbandry
✔️ Supporting practical teaching sessions
✔️ Assisting with the running of an animal unit
✔️ Working directly with a diverse animal collection
💡 Ideal for: Those with at least 8 months’ experience in an educational setting who are looking to develop their skills and experience in teaching and animal care.
🔒 Please note:
This opportunity is only available to UKACT members and can be found in the members area of the website.
https://www.ukact.org/keepcollaboration
📩 How to apply:
Download the application form and send it to [email protected]
All applications will be forwarded to the hosting collection for shortlisting, and successful applicants will be contacted directly.
👉 Don’t miss this opportunity to gain valuable experience and build your career in animal management!

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉The primate team at Howletts Wild Animal Park are excited to offer an amazing 2 day opportunity to ...
03/08/2026

🎉NEW PLACEMENT ALERT🎉

The primate team at Howletts Wild Animal Park are excited to offer an amazing 2 day opportunity to work with their amazing variety of primates from pied tamarins to Javan gibbons and so much in between!

This incredible opportunity will give someone the chance to see up close how the team care for these individuals, which could potentially include the giving of vaccinations, training and enrichment, diet and troop management.

The placement would benefit someone looking to gain experience working with a larger variety of primates and/ or develop their primate care skills.

To work with these fantastic animals whilst working with their dedicated and experienced keepers, register with us, submit your cv and cover letter and get your application in! When applying please specify if you have any specific interests or dates that work . The successful candidate can discuss a date for the placement with head keeper - it will be 2 consecutive days in September.

*Minimum experience requirement is 1 year of full time animal keeping experience in the UK and Ireland. *
🐒🐒🐒
Deadline for application is 16/08/2026
Placement dates: 2-5 consecutive days during September 2026
https://www.keeperexchange.org/vacancy/primate-keeper-7/

KEEPer skills workshop - speaker announcement! Team Building with BITE! "Whether you are a tools novice or are confident...
02/08/2026

KEEPer skills workshop - speaker announcement!

Team Building with BITE!

"Whether you are a tools novice or are confident with a drill, we have got you covered as participants will either get the chance to learn basic tool use with one of our instructors, or build a more challenging enrichment device to hone your existing skills with another.

Basic skills takes you step by step through setting up your tools and safe handling, discussing what bits are right for which jobs and then bringing everything together at the end by applying those skills learnt in creating a simple enrichment device to kick start your programme. Simultaneously we’ll be running an enrichment build for those more confident attendees, where they will work together to create a device which should expand their current skill set, try new or alternative tools that they might not have used before and experiment with some different materials. The end results will then be available for some participants to take home to their collections."

To attend the workshop you'll need a ticket from the link below;
https://biaza.org.uk/events/detail/keeper-skills-workshop
https://buytickets.at/keepereducationexchangeprog.../2208590
Ticket prices:
KEEP Member: £40.00
ABWAK, UKACT, SZN, BIAZA or UKACT Member: £50.00
Non-Member: £60.00
Snap up your ticket now before it's too late!

📸Cover photo competition time! 📸- Saturday EditionHello folks, bringing back a feature we haven't done for a while it'...
01/08/2026

📸Cover photo competition time! 📸- Saturday Edition

Hello folks, bringing back a feature we haven't done for a while it's cover photo competition time! Our lovely cover photo has done the job for a while now but considering the photos in this banner were from 2023 we figured it's time for an update!

No theme for this one but whether it's your favourite animal, training or enrichment success or perhaps a photo from a KEEP placement you've done - we're keen to see all sorts of entries! All you need to do is put your pics in the comments below, no need to be wildlife photographer of the year either!

What you do need to do is follow the guidelines from our friends to make sure any image you do enter can't be misinterpreted. We as animal keepers are very fortunate to get close to all sorts of amazing exotic animals so we need to make sure our social media imagery and use is responsible and helps protects the species we care so much about!

For more info on the great work that Sharesavvy are doing please head to their website or social media channels - https://sharesavvy.org/

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