In October 2016 Delhi's National Zoo was closed to the public due to a bird flu scare. Some dead birds had tested positive for it, I think birds from the wild waterbird colonies within the zoo grounds rather than the zoo's captive birds, and it remained closed for the next three months. I visited just a couple of weeks after it had reopened.
It is quite pleasant walking around the zoo in winter, because it is not too hot and the haze of pollution in the sky blocks the sun so no risk of getting burnt. I guess you choose between skin cancer and lung cancer in Delhi. Most of the photos I took look clouded because of all the smog. It was a Saturday and yet there were still big school-groups everywhere. The zoo is large enough that it doesn't feel crowded though. I went round first using the outside loop-road - going the opposite way to the arrows on the map - and this took about two hours. Then I spent another hour criss-crossing back and forth along the paths in the middle of the zoo, trying not to miss any of the enclosures.
I was very impressed with the Delhi Zoo. I have only visited a few other Indian zoos but they were all pretty poor, and the zoo in neighbouring Sri Lanka (the Colombo Zoo) was downright atrocious. The Delhi Zoo is actually what I had expected the Mumbai Zoo to be like, but wasn't. It has mostly good enclosures although as expected also a few of the older less-acceptable cages which haven't been upgraded or replaced yet, and usually there is excellent signage, or often double signage (i.e. a newer more-informative sign and one of the older signs). Even the trees around the zoo have name-plates to identify the species which isn't common in zoos.
The hooved stock are in large paddocks, usually well-treed with a dry moat at the front and a barrier (fence plus hedge) in front of that. Most of the ungulates are Indian species - e.g. nilgai, blackbuck (including "whitebuck"), and deer species - but there are a few exotics as well. The elephants (or elephant - I only saw one) was unchained in its paddock which was nice to see. The hippos had very small pens, although this is typical in many zoos unfortunately.
Primates were almost all on largish planted islands. Even the chimpanzee island was heavily-planted.
The carnivores were a mixed bag. The big cats were in the usual sort of largish moated enclosures, except the jaguars in poor tunnel-shaped cages. The bears had better-than-usual enclosures, moated and planted, but still not large. The small carnivores didn't do so well, and their cages rather let the zoo down. However their cages were still larger than is typical for Asian zoos and did at least have furniture in the shape of logs and branches; all also had straw-filled shelters to hide in which is unusual when it comes to small carnivore cages in Asian zoos.
The aviaries were mostly in one area around the Bird House and while not particularly nice to look at were quite large and there was nothing wrong with them apart from being rather too bare for the pheasants. A lot of them were glass-fronted. The Bird House itself was closed to the visitors but you could see in at one point and the aviaries inside were the same style as the outside aviaries (large, glass-fronted). I got the impression a lot of birds had either left the collection or were off-show. The ones on-show were mostly large parrots and pheasants, with some birds of prey in another area.
The Reptile House was an odd one. Almost every terrarium inside was a static display with plastic models of reptiles and dinosaurs. It was a very interesting way of doing things but nobody was actually paying attention to the displays - they would look in, see the model, and then just move on to try and find a real animal. There were some live reptiles signposted as being in a few of the tanks, but most were either hidden or absent. I only saw one Indian rock python, one Bengal monitor, and the star tortoises. The crocodylians in the following species lists were housed in outside pools elsewhere in the zoo.
There were still small sections of the zoo blocked off, and especially the birds seemed to be mostly either off-show or gone. But it certainly didn't feel like an emptied zoo, more like your regular zoo with some sections being upgraded.
The best animal at the zoo was the chousingha or four-horned antelope. I always seem to miss these at zoos which are supposed to have them. I thought I wasn't going to see them here either, after going round the whole zoo and not seeing any. I had seen a couple of arrowed signs pointing towards where they were supposed to be, but not found their enclosure. Finally, right at the end I did it. One chousingha. I couldn't see any others, so maybe they just have one left. It sort of looks like a cross between a gazelle and a muntjac. Very cool animal. And it was one of the few "new" animals at the zoo for me. (Otherwise just chinkara and Indian wolf; Indian fox would have been new too, but I didn't see that one in its cage).
It is quite pleasant walking around the zoo in winter, because it is not too hot and the haze of pollution in the sky blocks the sun so no risk of getting burnt. I guess you choose between skin cancer and lung cancer in Delhi. Most of the photos I took look clouded because of all the smog. It was a Saturday and yet there were still big school-groups everywhere. The zoo is large enough that it doesn't feel crowded though. I went round first using the outside loop-road - going the opposite way to the arrows on the map - and this took about two hours. Then I spent another hour criss-crossing back and forth along the paths in the middle of the zoo, trying not to miss any of the enclosures.
I was very impressed with the Delhi Zoo. I have only visited a few other Indian zoos but they were all pretty poor, and the zoo in neighbouring Sri Lanka (the Colombo Zoo) was downright atrocious. The Delhi Zoo is actually what I had expected the Mumbai Zoo to be like, but wasn't. It has mostly good enclosures although as expected also a few of the older less-acceptable cages which haven't been upgraded or replaced yet, and usually there is excellent signage, or often double signage (i.e. a newer more-informative sign and one of the older signs). Even the trees around the zoo have name-plates to identify the species which isn't common in zoos.
The hooved stock are in large paddocks, usually well-treed with a dry moat at the front and a barrier (fence plus hedge) in front of that. Most of the ungulates are Indian species - e.g. nilgai, blackbuck (including "whitebuck"), and deer species - but there are a few exotics as well. The elephants (or elephant - I only saw one) was unchained in its paddock which was nice to see. The hippos had very small pens, although this is typical in many zoos unfortunately.
Primates were almost all on largish planted islands. Even the chimpanzee island was heavily-planted.
The carnivores were a mixed bag. The big cats were in the usual sort of largish moated enclosures, except the jaguars in poor tunnel-shaped cages. The bears had better-than-usual enclosures, moated and planted, but still not large. The small carnivores didn't do so well, and their cages rather let the zoo down. However their cages were still larger than is typical for Asian zoos and did at least have furniture in the shape of logs and branches; all also had straw-filled shelters to hide in which is unusual when it comes to small carnivore cages in Asian zoos.
The aviaries were mostly in one area around the Bird House and while not particularly nice to look at were quite large and there was nothing wrong with them apart from being rather too bare for the pheasants. A lot of them were glass-fronted. The Bird House itself was closed to the visitors but you could see in at one point and the aviaries inside were the same style as the outside aviaries (large, glass-fronted). I got the impression a lot of birds had either left the collection or were off-show. The ones on-show were mostly large parrots and pheasants, with some birds of prey in another area.
The Reptile House was an odd one. Almost every terrarium inside was a static display with plastic models of reptiles and dinosaurs. It was a very interesting way of doing things but nobody was actually paying attention to the displays - they would look in, see the model, and then just move on to try and find a real animal. There were some live reptiles signposted as being in a few of the tanks, but most were either hidden or absent. I only saw one Indian rock python, one Bengal monitor, and the star tortoises. The crocodylians in the following species lists were housed in outside pools elsewhere in the zoo.
There were still small sections of the zoo blocked off, and especially the birds seemed to be mostly either off-show or gone. But it certainly didn't feel like an emptied zoo, more like your regular zoo with some sections being upgraded.
The best animal at the zoo was the chousingha or four-horned antelope. I always seem to miss these at zoos which are supposed to have them. I thought I wasn't going to see them here either, after going round the whole zoo and not seeing any. I had seen a couple of arrowed signs pointing towards where they were supposed to be, but not found their enclosure. Finally, right at the end I did it. One chousingha. I couldn't see any others, so maybe they just have one left. It sort of looks like a cross between a gazelle and a muntjac. Very cool animal. And it was one of the few "new" animals at the zoo for me. (Otherwise just chinkara and Indian wolf; Indian fox would have been new too, but I didn't see that one in its cage).
