ZooChat Cup Match #31: Leipzig vs Rhenen

[CGSwans]

A German titan and an ambitious Dutch zoo on the rise. The category: birds.

ZooChat Cup

In summary, the rules of the game are as follows:
- You may choose whatever criteria you like to decide how to vote, as long as it only relates to the category above.
- You can use whatever resources you like to inform your vote, including Zoolex, Zootierliste, the ZooChat gallery, trip reviews, zoo maps, books and wherever else. You don't have to have visited both zoos to vote.
- Votes are public and can be changed at any time before the poll closes.
- The aim of the game is to provoke debate. Post explaining why you voted the way you did, and why others should join you.
- Voting closes in four days
- The one thing you can't do is vote based on anything other than the relevant category.

 

[Mehdi]

I'm sure Ouwehands is a great zoo but it has to be Leipzig for me! (unless Ouwehands has something very special for birds, I'm not sure but can thankfully still change my vote).

 

[ShonenJake13]

I'm sure Ouwehands is a great zoo but it has to be Leipzig for me! (unless Ouwehands has something very special for birds, I'm not sure but can thankfully still change my vote).

Ouwehands has a brilliant selection of hornbills, plus some nice aviary mixes and some other colourful birds (macaws, cockatoos, bateleur eagles). However, Leipzig does have Gondwanaland amongst other things.
So, for now, I will be going with Leipzig for this one.

 

[Mr. Zootycoon]

Just for everyone still making up their mind about this one (like me), let me sketch the current state of the bird collection of Ouwehands.

Most prominent are the hornbill aviaries you see directly when you enter. These hold a variety of species with great hornbill, wreathed hornbill, Blyth's hornbill, rhinoceros hornbill, rufous hornbill and wrinkled hornbill. Although because of winter I don't know which ones will be on show again this year. All but the rhinoceros hornbill are housed well.

Hornbill aviaries | ZooChat

The next main bird eclosure is the giant Urucu aviary, which hold scarlet macaws, scarlet ibis, american flamingo, fulvous whistling duck, wood duck, white-cheeked pintail, inca tern and blue-throated piping guan. The aviary has a lot of indoor spaces for the macaws that regularly breed there. It is large enough to show real flight in the macaws, something that is unfortunately still rare in zoos.

Urucu Aviary | ZooChat
Macaw indoor enclosure | ZooChat

The Ori house has some free living birds like java sparrows and fire-crowned bishop (and nicobar pigeon in with the mouse deer occasionally), but the next important bird area is a set of toucan aviaries. They are spacious, nicely decorated and occupied with green aracari, toco toucan, keel-billed toucan and white-throated toucan, although one of the latter two has gone offshow/left the collection recently. There's also a weaver aviary in RavotApia.

mixed species exhibit | ZooChat
right side of the new Toucan aviary | ZooChat

The (former?) Waddensea exhibit has cormorants, red-crested pochards, scarlet ibis and maybe a few other ducks and geese in with the seals. Just outside of it there's a small-ish enclosure for a pair of saddle-billed storks. The last birds in this corner of the park are the chickens and ducks in the (excellent) petting zoo and a pair of white-naped cranes. The next birds you come across are the humboldt penguins in a simple but nice enclosure.

Saddle-billed stork exhibit | ZooChat
Humboldt Penguin exhibit | ZooChat

Between the polar bears and the brown bears there are two sets of two avaires. One is very large and houses grey crowned cranes, ground hornbill, crested guineafowl and bateleur eagle. A set of smaller enclosures are occupied by a pair of hyacinth macaws and a pair of cockatoos.
Close to it is a pond with a few greater flamingos, and a former red panda enclosure renovated to house snowy owls.

Parrot aviary | ZooChat
Greater Flamingo exhibbit | ZooChat

Close to Pandasia there's a huge pond for pelicans, as well as a construction site for a new flamingo exhibit. The main bird attraction in the last part of the park is a huge avairy providing actual flying space for cinereous vultures and king vultures. Again something that is still not the norm. The last real bird exhibit is a set of two avaires inside the African/mandril house. They are nicely decorated and occupied by Von der Decken's hornbills, greater blue-eared starlings and red-crested turaco.

Cinereous vulture aviary | ZooChat
Aviary inside the mandrilhouse | ZooChat

To conclude the bird collection of Ouwehand the African savannah houses a few ostriches and guinea fowl along with the giraffes.

African plain | ZooChat

 

[SabineB]

Totally non rational vote,

it was me I am the vote for Rhenen. It is totally not based on anything factual. I learned to be interested in birds in Rhenen. I never was before, but I learned about weavers in Rhenen (thats just a funny, because I actually sat an entire day there and watched them build their nests because I found it so tearing then) years ago and from there on I was a bird person.

Anyway - vote for Leipzig all you want. I am team Rhenen. HA!

 

[FunkyGibbon]

Just for everyone still making up their mind about this one (like me), let me sketch the current state of the bird collection of Ouwehands.

Most prominent are the hornbill aviaries you see directly when you enter. These hold a variety of species with great hornbill, wreathed hornbill, Blyth's hornbill, rhinoceros hornbill, rufous hornbill and wrinkled hornbill. Although because of winter I don't know which ones will be on show again this year. All but the rhinoceros hornbill are housed well.

Hornbill aviaries | ZooChat

The next main bird eclosure is the giant Urucu aviary, which hold scarlet macaws, scarlet ibis, american flamingo, fulvous whistling duck, wood duck, white-cheeked pintail, inca tern and blue-throated piping guan. The aviary has a lot of indoor spaces for the macaws that regularly breed there. It is large enough to show real flight in the macaws, something that is unfortunately still rare in zoos.

Urucu Aviary | ZooChat
Macaw indoor enclosure | ZooChat

The Ori house has some free living birds like java sparrows and fire-crowned bishop (and nicobar pigeon in with the mouse deer occasionally), but the next important bird area is a set of toucan aviaries. They are spacious, nicely decorated and occupied with green aracari, toco toucan, keel-billed toucan and white-throated toucan, although one of the latter two has gone offshow/left the collection recently. There's also a weaver aviary in RavotApia.

mixed species exhibit | ZooChat
right side of the new Toucan aviary | ZooChat

The (former?) Waddensea exhibit has cormorants, red-crested pochards, scarlet ibis and maybe a few other ducks and geese in with the seals. Just outside of it there's a small-ish enclosure for a pair of saddle-billed storks. The last birds in this corner of the park are the chickens and ducks in the (excellent) petting zoo and a pair of white-naped cranes. The next birds you come across are the humboldt penguins in a simple but nice enclosure.

Saddle-billed stork exhibit | ZooChat
Humboldt Penguin exhibit | ZooChat

Between the polar bears and the brown bears there are two sets of two avaires. One is very large and houses grey crowned cranes, ground hornbill, crested guineafowl and bateleur eagle. A set of smaller enclosures are occupied by a pair of hyacinth macaws and a pair of cockatoos.
Close to it is a pond with a few greater flamingos, and a former red panda enclosure renovated to house snowy owls.

Parrot aviary | ZooChat
Greater Flamingo exhibbit | ZooChat

Close to Pandasia there's a huge pond for pelicans, as well as a construction site for a new flamingo exhibit. The main bird attraction in the last part of the park is a huge avairy providing actual flying space for cinereous vultures and king vultures. Again something that is still not the norm. The last real bird exhibit is a set of two avaires inside the African/mandril house. They are nicely decorated and occupied by Von der Decken's hornbills, greater blue-eared starlings and red-crested turaco.

Cinereous vulture aviary | ZooChat
Aviary inside the mandrilhouse | ZooChat

To conclude the bird collection of Ouwehand the African savannah houses a few ostriches and guinea fowl along with the giraffes.

African plain | ZooChat

This is a very high quality post, and until someone actually makes a case for Leipzig that is longer than one word I will vote for Ouwehands off the back of it.

It's funny, Rhenen receives a lot of sneers or unlove on this forum, yet everything I have ever seen or read about it has pushed me to want to visit more and more.

 

[CGSwans]

This is a very high quality post, and until someone actually makes a case for Leipzig that is longer than one word I will vote for Ouwehands off the back of it.

It's funny, Rhenen receives a lot of sneers or unlove on this forum, yet everything I have ever seen or read about it has pushed me to want to visit more and more.

This is one where Zootierliste is quite misleading, I feel. Leipzig has a long-ish species list but when you're actually there birds seem scarcely noticeable. I'm sure there's lots in Gondwanaland but it's so cavernous, and the path strictly defined (unlike Burgers Bush, for example) so that you're not likely to *see* many apart from high up in the rafters, where you're seeing them but hardly able to appreciate them.

There's a small, far more traditional tropical house that has a smattering of smaller birds, and it's quite nice as far as it goes, though some are in glass cabinets and I've never warmed to that method of display for birds. Outside you have an antiquated penguin exhibit and a row of utterly nondescript aviaries for various parrots and other mid-sized birds.

I'm 'parking' my vote with Rhenen pending further consideration, but this is probably Leipzig's weakest category (which does admittedly speak to its overall strength).

 

[TeaLovingDave]

There's a small, far more traditional tropical house that has a smattering of smaller birds, and it's quite nice as far as it goes, though some are in glass cabinets and I've never warmed to that method of display for birds. Outside you have an antiquated penguin exhibit and a row of utterly nondescript aviaries for various parrots and other mid-sized birds.

More to the point, the Bird House is scheduled for demolition as one of the last remaining "non-geozone" exhibits - although this keeps being postponed.

 

[vogelcommando]

Not having been at Leipzig sofar but from German televisions "daily-soap" about Leipzig I know they have some nice bird-species and some nice enclosures and esp. their good results with Lesser flamingos let me think Leipzig is doing quite well with birds but evenso Ouwehands wins this one for me because of the Hornbills ( both collections as housing ), Toucans ( also collection and housing ) and the number of other enclosure around the zoo ( and even outside the zoo - owl aviary ).

 

[LaughingDove]

I've not been to Rhenen, but here's a case for Leipzig (for @FunkyGibbon and others) from my visit three years ago (so anyone who has visited more recently - let me know if anything has changed).

I really liked the free-flying birds in Gondwanaland. When I visited there were 21 bird species free-flying in Gondwanaland and I saw almost all of the species. There are fodies flying around all over the place to give an immediate impression of there being plenty of birds around, a few larger species like Turacos and Piping-Guans and ground birds like pheasant pigeons.

These were the free-flying birds in Gondwanaland according to the signage when I visited, with those I actually saw in bold:

Lesser Brazilian Teal
Fulvous Whistling Duck
Blue-black Grassquit
Madagascar Red Fody - This species is the most common and you can't go far at all without seeing several
Masked Lapwing
Sunbittern
Nicobar Pigeon
Crested Wood Partridge
Brahminy Starling
Red-whiskered Bulbul
Hartlaub's Turaco
White-rumped Shama
Cuban Grassquit
Pied Imperial Pigeon - quite common
Victoria Crowned Pigeon
White-crowned Robin Chat
Pheasant Pigeon
Blue-throated Piping Guan
Collared Kingfisher
Black Crake - pair very visible from the boat nesting
Great Kiskadee

Apparently most people don't see this many and I did spend a total of about two hours in Gondwanaland, but I saw all of those species up close and clearly enough to identify (I didn't have binoculars with me or anything). The vast majority I also photographed. The free-flying birds really made Gondwanaland for me. And there are Wrinkled Hornbills in an enclosure in Gondwanaland too.

In terms of other birds, there's a nice big waterbird aviary near the elephant house, some exotic ducks around the zoo's waterways (clipped/pinion of course - unfortunately) but most significantly in terms of waterbirds is their flamingo aviary. It's by far the best I have ever seen. It's an aesthetically nicely done (in typical Leipzig style) walkthrough aviary with a nice boardwalk across the water and it is really big and really tall with, when I visited, two flamingo species, six waterfowl species, two ibis species and a spoonbill.

There's a lovely little bird house at Leipzig too. Not big and flashy like their new developments, but with a certain charm and a few unusual species like Turquoise Tanager (although looking at Zootierliste, apparently not Barred Buttonquail anymore) with a walkthrough free-flying bird area as well as some smaller enclosures.

And there are further birds free-flying in the Pongoland Ape House, including a number of relatively unusual species, and other birds dotted around the zoo too in fairly boring, but not bad aviaries, including larger parrots, owls, pheasants, red-billed blue-magpie etc. as well as a Japanese Crane paddock.

It's a decent bird collection with a nice little bird house as well and a fantastic flamingo aviary, as well as all the birds in Gondwanaland which is the sort of bird experience that few zoos can provide.

 

[Mr. Zootycoon]

It's funny, Rhenen receives a lot of sneers or unlove on this forum, yet everything I have ever seen or read about it has pushed me to want to visit more and more.

Rhenen is an excellent zoo, but it may be overshadowed by the Dutch giants like Burgers' and Blijdorp. To be fair, it was a bit run down until a couple of years ago and I guess many people still think of Ouwehand the way it was back then.

I just hope that people who vote against Rhenen can now do that based on the actual bird collection of Ouwehand, not simply "because Leipzig".

 

[Dassie rat]

Both: Scarlet ibis; waldrapp; Chilean flamingo; fulvous whistling duck; red-crested pochard; mandarin duck; red-shouldered teal; northern pintail; smew; helmeted guineafowl; white-naped crane; hyacinth macaw; Nicobar pigeon; budgerigar; red-crested turaco; southern ground, wrinkled and Von der Decken’s hornbills

Leipzig
Lesser rhea; North African ostrich
Jackass penguin
Dalmatian pelican
Black-crowned and Philippine rufous night herons; Indian pond heron; marabou stork; glossy, black-faced and black-faced ibises; roseate spoonbill
Lesser flamingo
African pygmy goose; South African and rosy-billed pochards; Old World comb, Indian spot-billed, South African yellow-billed, ferruginous and white-headed ducks; white-faced, lesser and spotted whistling ducks; Chiloe and Eurasian wigeons; Cape, puna, Eurasian green-winged and lesser Brazilian teals; northern shoveler; common eider; Rajah shelduck;
Western Eurasian griffon vulture
Himalayan monal; Palawan peacock and Swinhoe’s pheasants; Asian blue quail; crested wood partridge; black-shouldered blue peafowl; blue-throated piping guan
Red-crowned, and southern grey-crowned cranes; sunbittern; black crake
Masked lapwing
Ural and little owls
Blue-crowned hanging parrot; Mexican green military, chestnut-fronted and scarlet macaws; red-lored and Cuban amazons; kea; monk parakeet; citron-crested cockatoo; rainbow lorikeet
Luzon bleeding-heart; Crested quail and cinnamon ground doves; pied imperial, Sclater’s crowned, pink-necked and Sierra Leone green pigeons
Violet and Hartlaub’s turacos
Collared kingfisher
Red-and-yellow barbet; black-necked aracari
Bali mynah; blue-grey, blue-and-yellow, turquoise and Brazilian tanagers; blue-crowned laughing thrush ; Boehm’s buffalo weaver; Asian black and Layard’s bulbuls; superb, Brahminy and wattled starlings; yellow-crowned gonolek; blue-backed and Cuban grassquits; Kilimanjaro white-eye; Madagascar fody; Uganda red-billed firefinch; purple and red-legged honeycreepers; double-barred finch; red-throated parrotfinch; red-whiskered bulbul; Peking robin; lavender and purple-bellied waxbills; great kiskadee; white-headed buffalo weaver; Asian fairy blue bird; snowy-crowned and white-crowned robin chats; white-rumped shama

Rhehen
Common emu; common ostrich
Humboldt penguin
Eurasian great cormorant; great white pelican
Hamerkop; sacred ibis; western cattle egret; saddle-billed stork
Caribbean and greater flamingos
Brazilian teal; Bahama pintail; North American wood duck; common goldeneye; American wigeon; hooded and red-breasted mergansers; red-crested pochard; flying steamer duck; marbled teal; red-breasted barnacle and bar-headed geese;
Bataleur eagle; Eurasian black and king vultures
Indian blue peafowl; vulturine and crested guineafowls
Grey-crowned crane
Inca tern
Snowy owl
Blue-and-yellow macaw; Major Mitchell’s and salmon-crested cockatoos
Great, northern rufous, Papuan, Sulawesi knobbed, Javan rhinoceros and wreathed hornbills
Green aracari; white-throated, kell-billed and toco toucans
Greater blue-eared glossy starling

Leipzig wins on variety and number of species. Rhenen has a far better collection of hornbills, but only one species of perching bird. As perching birds comprise most species of birds, this is very poor.

 

[vogelcommando]

For Rhenen you forgot Village weaver ..

 

[Vision]

Lesser Brazilian Teal
Fulvous Whistling Duck
Blue-black Grassquit
Madagascar Red Fody - This species is the most common and you can't go far at all without seeing several
Masked Lapwing
Sunbittern
Nicobar Pigeon
Crested Wood Partridge
Brahminy Starling
Red-whiskered Bulbul
Hartlaub's Turaco
White-rumped Shama
Cuban Grassquit
Pied Imperial Pigeon - quite common
Victoria Crowned Pigeon
White-crowned Robin Chat
Pheasant Pigeon
Blue-throated Piping Guan
Collared Kingfisher
Black Crake - pair very visible from the boat nesting
Great Kiskadee

If memory serves me right, on my visit in 2016 together with @KevinVar and @GerbenElzinga we saw a similar amount of species (interestingly, blue-black grassquit was one of the species we saw most then). Madagascar crested ibises were also present on our visit.

In my opinion, when it comes to keeping many small tropical birds, one of the best ways of doing so will always be a large walkthrough jungle, in which birds with different niches can truly find a place where they prefer being, and where a visitor gets a much better grasp of how these species live in the wild. Gondwanaland might not be Burger's Bush or Zurich's Masoala when it comes to how natural things appear, and for the large mammals in it a case can probably be made that it isn't beneficial for them to be in there, but for the birds it is truly a magnificent exhibit.

Add the best and (probably) largest flamingo aviary I've ever seen, an excellent outdoor penguin enclosure, a fantastic small bird house, and a great savanna enclosure with ostriches, and I don't think Rhenen has much of a chance... Though I did very much enjoy reading @Mr. Zootycoon 's post, and am now convinced I have to go there some time.

 

[Dassie rat]

For Rhenen you forgot Village weaver ..

I accept that ZTL isn't totally up to date, but I couldn't find the village weaver at Rhenen using ZTL, but Ruinen has village weavers, as do many craft fairs.

 

[vogelcommando]

Rhenen has them also for sure, in an aviary near the small-clawed otters. Some picture I made on Oct. 15 2017 :

 

[lintworm]

I am surprised Rhenen gets so many votes, apart from the hornbills and toucans, the bird collection is very slim and not really outstanding enclosures. Whereas Leipzig has a good allround bird collection in mostly nice enclosures. Also bonus for them as they should have free-flying King vultures in Gondwanaland.

 

[Vision]

Also bonus for them as they should have free-flying King vultures in Gondwanaland.

Are you sure about this? In 2016 I heard rumors about the fact that this was going to happen, but I don't think I ever heard it actually did, and zootierliste even says the species left the collection back in 2016...

 

[BjoernN]

Free flying King vultures are already planed for the next years...

I wish we had more rare birds...

 

[korhoen]

I am surprised Rhenen gets so many votes, apart from the hornbills and toucans, the bird collection is very slim and not really outstanding enclosures. Whereas Leipzig has a good allround bird collection in mostly nice enclosures. Also bonus for them as they should have free-flying King vultures in Gondwanaland.

I agree with you about the size of the bird collection at Ouwehands, but I disagree regarding the outstanding enclosures. The macaw aviary at Ouwehands is still the best I have ever seen and the vulture aviary is also excellent. The rest of the bird exhibits are all good to very good (hornbill and toucan aviaries) in my opinion. I do however not doubt that Leipzig also has excellent bird exhibits (I have not yet visited) and they also have the better and larger collection, so I'm fine with them winning.