Let's try this again, not using an unedited draft this time. I struggle mightily with writer's block, and often can't bear to read back what I bash out, especially when I feel it's turgid rubbish. But I shall try to do better.
Zoo #20 - Zoo Bratislava, 30/04/2017
This might be one stop that few people saw coming.
I hadn't intended to visit Slovakia until quite late in my planning stage, when I was looking at the train route from Vienna to my next destination and discovered that it apparently passed through Slovakia. This would not do: I could not physically enter a country without doing any more than look out the window of a train. It would be Schrodinger's visit: I would simultaneously have been in, but not *been in*, Slovakia. There was nothing else for it to make a day trip from Vienna, and so Bratislava took its place on the itinerary. As it turns out, I was looking at the wrong route, and my train didn't pass through Slovakia after all. So my trip was unnecessary, but never mind. I enjoyed the afternoon well enough.
Bratislava is my first 'post-Communist' zoo. It's a category that I have some interest in exploring, because it encompasses some of the most well-regarded zoos in Europe - especially those noted for the breadth of their collections, such as the Tierpark and Plzen - as well as many that might be considered as sub-standard. I wonder, is there any meaning to calling a zoo 'post-Communist', or has enough time passed that variations in government support, average incomes in host cities and the strength or otherwise of the local tourist industry speak more to what each zoo has become since 1989 than does whatever they were before that year?
It's fair to say Bratislava does not rank among those post-Communist zoos that make it into the continent's top tier. There are a couple of bits and pieces that are indeed sub-standard, and unpardonably so, but the overall sense I had when leaving was that it has unrealised potential, and that much of that potential can be realised without simply wishing away what I am sure are some tight budget constraints. No zoo director wants to have the problems Bratislava has.
I am thinking specifically of two exhibits. A brown bear inhabits a pair of mid-20th century concrete bear pits, each perhaps the size of a typical lounge room, and has access to the night den between them so it can choose which of the three spaces it uses. In defence of Bratislava, this at least shows they have done what they can to maximise the bear's space, but three times an unacceptable habitat is still an unacceptable habitat if space is not the only problem. And space is not the only problem. This is exactly the sort of exhibit that must be driven out of reputable zoos everywhere, at the greatest possible speed, not only for the benefit of the bear, but to protect the reputation of good zoos everywhere. We all rail at the more mendacious claims of animal rights activists, but if we want to defend our institution we have to discredit their arguments. Bratislava's bear exhibit discredits ours' instead.
The other unacceptable problem is the Hamadryas baboon exhibit, which is a cage for (I think only) two baboons that is closer in size to a tamarin enclosure than anything I'd like to put baboons in. I don't mind its ugliness - it looks like a cell from Alcatraz - but I do mind that a highly active, intelligent and social species doesn't have adequate opportunities for activity, stimulation and social behaviour.
Less seriously, in relation to the baboons, was perhaps the most unintentionally amusing sign I've ever seen in a zoo. The cage is up a series of steps, and not overly noticeable from the main path. So a sign points towards it, saying it is only 20 paces, up eight steps to the cage. All well and good, but obviously somebody in head office feared encountering an angry guest who had counted out 21 paces on their way to the baboons, because in finer print it specifies that it is "measured by average female step, using an average long (sic) of female legs". I admire the attention to detail and scientific rigour, if not the translation.
There appears to be three areas of relatively recent (ie, post-2000) development. There's a series of identical big cat complexes for lions, white tigers, leopards and jaguars, with each consisting of a small (too small, really) outdoor yard and a separate night quarters, but for three of the four species (the lions being the exception) each of these were occupied. There was a tiger outside and one shut inside, and the same for the leopards and jaguars. I don't really understand how that's sustainable as an ongoing management practice, and it's certainly a poor situation for the cats. They need to pick two species and move two out.
The apes building - for groups of chimpanzees and orangutans - is much better. Both species have big, useful spaces both inside and out. One thing I realised here was that, wherever I go and regardless of the conditions outside, animals that have access to indoor quarters tend to use them. It was a lovely sunny day, with not a single ape outside.
The zoo's best offering is a heavily forested section with a couple of Eurasian exhibits, including an *enormous* enclosure for grey wolves. It's just a simple wire fence enclosing native forest, but it's big, it's undulating, it's complex and it's just about perfect for the two wolves. There's also big yards here for wisent, kulan and red deer, the latter of which recedes so far off into the depths of the forest that I couldn't pick where it ended. I would dearly love to see the same approach taken for a new bear exhibit in this same part of the zoo.
If that's an indication of Bratislava's future then it's relatively bright. The zoo occupies a very large site - there's lots of walking between groups of exhibits - and there is a lot that could be done here without resorting to financial magical thinking. There's an enormous empty paddock - probably about 3 hectares in size - that separates a section of ancient enclosures for rhinos, hyenas and emus (among others) from the rest of the zoo. With some relatively moderate development it could become an excellent savannah exhibit for the zoo's zebras and antelopes, and with a bit more investment the giraffes and perhaps even rhinos could go here too.
I wouldn't be increasing the size of the collection, though. They already have all of the basic ABC animals except elephants, penguins, seals and hippos, and I suspect all of them would stretch the resources of this place too far.
All in all, I don't think Bratislava qualifies as a "good zoo", but it's mostly an acceptable one, with the wolf exhibit a notable bright spot. With the exception of the over-stocked big cat section, they have done a reasonably good job of opening up previously undersized exhibits to provide more space for fewer animals - the rhino and hyena exhibits are notable examples where what were clearly multiple exhibits in the past are now single enclosures.
I hope they continue down this path. I'll be watching with interest to see what their next move is: as long as it involves baboons or a bear I'll be happy.
