Lotherton Hall Deer Park Leeds LS25 3EB

"I'll start with the positives: wonderful house and exhibitions included in the £9/adult entry few, nice cafe (though it is overpriced...£4.65 for a bog standard cheese and ham or tuna sandwich, on white bread in those triangular boxes), fabulous gardens, some beautiful trees and amazing plants, a child's play park though the zip wire was broken and there's only one, let useless push swing. Kids under 5 are free and you can see the deer to the right as you drive in. And there's plenty of car parking. So why only 2 stars? The animals. I'm still upset hours after coming home. Most of the animals show extensive signs of trauma (boredom, lack of stimulatatuon and possibly companionship, and certainly lack of space from being couped up in wholly inadequate pens/cages. Some of the bigger birds and even the emu has very clear signs of self harm (biting their own feathers off themselves). It was most distressing and frankly an appalling state for a council-run establishment. The pen that the white peacock is in its so ridiculously small that when it had its full plume on show, which it did for most of the time that we were in the wildlife zone, the bird and its feathers filled the cage. That bird too showed clear signs of my previous comments (above). The flamingos, as pretty as the are, are couped up too much. There were at least 3 rats that we saw in the porcupine enclosure (not exhibit rats either). The penguins left a lot of the dead fish that they were fed, and the beautiful big owl has about 20 feet of space to fly in... it's all so wrong. One of the nocturnal animals, I forget the name of it, just paces back and forth, constantly in front of the glass. It's cruel and not nice at all to see. Why are these animals being allowed to be kept like this? It killed all the enjoyment of my day. This needs to be addressed and visitors need to speak up too."

"Lovely place, bring our grandsons regularly so well worth the annual ticket. shame they have changed the ice cream van to a far more expensive one with very poor choice. Cafe can be busy so a picnic is a good idea."

"Nice wintry walk in the grounds and gardens."

"Walks, play ground, adventure play ground, large animal area, stately home and cafe with ice cream van. Easy way to occupy a family for several hours."