Why this London zoo display is gaining attention online

ZSL London Zoo. (Image credit: Twitter)

A zoo in London putting a crocodile skin bag on display has gained great attention on social media.

ZSL London Zoo visitors become surprised on seeing that in the reptiles section, there is an inanimate object in place of a crocodile.

But the bag has been placed there for a very important reason -- to draw attention to the illegal hunting of crocodiles for their skin.

A message accompanying the display read: "This bag used to be found swimming in slow-moving streams across Southeast Asia and Indonesia".

A zoo visitor share a photo of the bag on Twitter. It gathered nearly 4 lakh likes and about 69,000 re-tweets.

London zoo not pissing around pic.twitter.com/C9cxoDCba2

— TM (@sleepy_homo) August 1, 2022

According to a BBC report, the bag, made of the skin of a Siamese crocodile, was seized at an airport in London in 2018. Siamese crocodiles are rare, with only 500 to 1,000 of the kind alive worldwide .

Officials had given the bag to ZSL London Zoo to help create awareness about how illegal trade was hurting the reptiles.

Dr Ben Tapley, one of the zoo's curators, said he was happy about the impact the bag display was having on visitors.

"It's great to have all these fantastic animals here but the handbag has caught people's eye," he told the BBC. "We wanted to educate our visitors about it and create a talking point. Anything which shines a spotlight on the illegal trade is great."

ZSL London Zoo works to conserve wild animals and their habitats around the world.

"From locating the remaining populations of threatened species to promoting sustainable wildlife-human relations in local communities, our projects address the variety of problems facing wildlife using a wide array of solutions," they said on their website.