posted August 26, 2005 08:45 PM         

LONDON (AFP) - London Zoo unveiled a new exhibition -- eight humans prowling around wearing little more than fig leaves to cover their modesty.

The "Human Zoo" is intended to show the basic nature of human beings as they frolick throughout the August bank holiday weekend.

"We have set up this exhibit to highlight the spread of man as a plague species and to communicate the importance of man's place in the planet's ecosystem," London Zoo said.

The scantily-clad volunteers will be treated as animals and kept amused at the central London zoo with games and music.

"I actually think the fig leaves will be enough to cover us up, it's no worse than a swimming pool," said volunteer Simon Spiro, 19, from New Malden, south of the British capital.

Spiro, selected from dozens of hopefuls in an Internet competition, said he was excited by the prospect of monkeying around on the zoo's Bear Mountain.

"I'm a veterinary student so the idea of working for a zoo was something that appealed to me.

"I thought it would be fun and interesting because I'm an outdoorsy kind of person," he said.

Brendan Carr, 25, from Aylesbury, southern England, wrote a poem in his bid to get on the mountain.

"I'm funky like a monkey and as cool as a cat, talk more than a parrot, up all night like a bat," it went.