Our Zoo, the popular and well received TV drama about the history of Chester Zoo will not return for a second series, the BBC has confirmed.

Despite pulling in more than £5m viewers per episode during its six-part run earlier this year, and being nominated for two National TV Awards, BBC1's Our Zoo has not been renewed for another series.

The news will come as a huge disappointment to fans of the show, many of whom described it as 'the best thing on TV in ages'.

But a BBC spokesperson told The Chronicle that although it was 'very proud' of the show, which starred household names Anne Reid and Ralf Little as members of zoo founders the Mottershead family, a 'hard choice' had to be made.

"We are very proud of Our Zoo and would like to thank all those involved," the spokesperson said. "However, in order to create room for new shows and to keep increasing the range of BBC One drama we sometimes have to make hard choices and it will not be returning for a second series."

Just two months ago, Caroline Sanger-Davies, Chester Zoo's Head of Marketing, said the tourist attraction had experienced a huge surge of popularity during the show's primetime run.

"It’s definitely made a big impression," she said at the time. "We’ve gathered postcodes from visitors this September compared to last September and they have really shown a spread of people travelling here from various places. September is very well supported usually but we have definitely seen visitors from further afield which we attribute to the success of Our Zoo.

“It is so lovely to see people standing outside Oakfield Manor having obviously seen the show on TV."

June Williams, who grew up in Chester Zoo after her father George bought it in 1930, made a brief cameo in the series as one of the protesters who were originally against George buying Oakfield Manor.