ZooChat Cup finals: Beauval vs Chester

[amur leopard]

Don't think that will be necessary - the discrepancy can probably be covered by you inadvertently miscounting for Chester, and (as people have noted above) counting dubiously valid species such as colobus, gorilla, bongo and red river hog for Beauval.

These were just mistakes in the posts I quoted, I haven't icluded them in the lists, don't worry

As for conservation efforts, I saw that 3 of them are for the same species after a glance, so if this is indicative of all their conservation efforts' breadth, they don't actually support that many species.

Also, the PICODE project supports all of the animal species in Djibouti...

 

[TeaLovingDave]

These were just mistakes in the posts I quoted, I haven't icluded them in the lists, don't worry

You did, however, include species such as the following in the body of your argument:

It has around 10 fantastic exhibits for African ungulates scattered around the zoo for Lesser kudu, Mountain bongo, Somali wild ass, Sable antelope, Nyala, Red river hog, Hippopotami (more on that exhibit in a sec), Blue wildebeest, Springbok, Reticulated giraffe, Grevy's zebra, Beisa oryx.

There is also the exhibit for takins in the Chinese area and the big cat enclosures.

There is also the fantastic plains exhibit for Asiatic hoofstock, sized at over 17000 m2. Only a small part of it is covered by the walkway, allowing the animals in question privacy. Species exhibited include Greater one-horned rhinoceroses, Blackbucks, Malayan tapirs and many others.

There is also the Australian greenhouse which is mostly grassland themed. It shows animals like Koalas, woylies and many species of bird in large and well-landscaped exhibits.

 

[TeaLovingDave]

As for conservation efforts, I saw that 3 of them are for the same species after a glance, so if this is indicative of all their conservation efforts' breadth, they don't actually support that many species.

Also, the PICODE project supports all of the animal species in Djibouti...

Projects which Chester is involved in which pertain to grasslands and/or deserts; note I slightly miscounted and there are actually 16 programmes with a bearing on the matter.

LIVING WITH TIGERS PROJECT - collaboration with the Nepali government and conservation NGOs in the Terai Lowlands to educate the local population about co-habitation with the recovering Bengal Tiger population in the region.

KIDEPO GIRAFFE PROJECT, UGANDA - in-situ research into the reasons for the slow recovery rate of the giraffe population in Kidepo National Park when compared to other African megafauna, using genetic testing, GPS tracking and population surveys.

LOWLAND TAPIR PROJECT - in-situ work with the Lowland Tapir populations in the Cerrado and Pantanal (possibly same project as cited for Beauval)

GIANT ARMADILLO PROJECT - in-situ work with the Giant Armadillo populations in the Cerrado and Pantanal (same project as cited for Beauval)

ANTEATERS AND HIGHWAYS PROJECT - in-situ work with the Giant Anteater tracking their behaviour and interaction with roads/highways in order to reduce mortality from roadkill (same project as cited for Beauval)

CONSERVING THE EASTERN BLACK RHINO - in-situ work with the Eastern Black Rhinoceros in Kenya; one of the keystone projects for Chester and coupled with other related projects, including the captive breeding and reintroduction programme spearheaded by Chester.

SOCIAL HEALTH AND WELLBEING IN ELEPHANTS - in-situ and ex-situ work into the social dynamics, and impact of this on reproductive success, of captive and wild African and Asian Elephants.

ELEPHANT ENDOTHELIOTROPIC HERPESVIRUS (EEHV) - in-situ and ex-situ work into finding a way to combat the effect of this condition on wild and captive Asian Elephants.

CONSERVATION PHYSIOLOGY TOOLBOX - work into creating a genetic library for several category species, such as Grevy's and Cape Mountain Zebra, African Hunting Dog and Eastern Black Rhinoceros, which can be used to monitor the health of both in-situ and ex-situ populations. This project also develops similar libraries for other physiological markers of population health and dynamics.

CAPE MOUNTAIN ZEBRA RESEARCH PROJECT - in-situ work looking at the population dynamics and genetics of the Cape Mountain Zebra and how this can be applied to captive breeding programmes and the in-situ recovery of the species.

GREVYS ZEBRA RESEARCH PROJECT - in-situ work looking at the population dynamics of the Grevys Zebra and how this can be applied to captive breeding programmes and the in-situ recovery of the species.

JAGUARS OF THE CAATINGA - in-situ conservation of the critically endangered Jaguar sub-population in the Caatinga scrub/semidesert of Brazil, and programmes aimed at education of the local population about cohabitation with the species.

BLACK RHINOCEROS PROGRAMME - affiliated with the programme above, focusing on the
Chyulu Hills National Park, Kenya and Mkomazi National Park, Tanzania.

IDENTIFYING FACTORS THAT IMPACT ON THE BREEDING POTENTIAL OF BLACK RHINOS IN ZOOS - ex-situ programme, closely tied with in-situ programmes described above.

AFRICAN PAINTED DOG BREEDING AND REINTRODUCTION PROGRAMME - in-situ work in Tanzania, coupled with ex-situ breeding.

HUMAN-JAGUAR CONFLICT PROJECT - affiliated with the Caatinga programme above, and extending the community work to locations throughout Latin America.

---

Also, if your intention in pointing out that Chester supports multiple projects devoted to the Eastern Black Rhinoceros is to imply this is a bad thing and a point against them in terms of conservation, I really do have to laugh as you're actually making my point for me in terms of how strong they are in this regard!

Also, even if you lump the Black Rhinoceros programmes into one point, they still have more than you listed for Beauval

 

[amur leopard]

Except Beauval has more than I listed:

Giant eland
Giraffe
Giant anteater
African elephant
Lion
Barbary macaque
PICODE
Black rhinoceros
White rhinoceros
South American tapir
Giant armadillo
Cheetah
Nikolo-Koba reserve, Senegal


Note that two of these support thousands of species, not just one.

 

[Giant Panda]

How many in situ programs a zoo supports doesn't tell you much about their contribution to conservation. The size/nature of their contributions and effectiveness of the programs are what matters.

 

[TeaLovingDave]

How many in situ programs a zoo supports doesn't tell you much about their contribution to conservation. The size/nature of their contributions and effectiveness of the programs are what matters.

Which puts what I wanted to say about the importance and sway of the work Chester undertakes with Black Rhinoceros (and to lesser extent - given not all Asian Elephants are grassland - the EEHV work) into much better words than I could

 

[Ursus]

I think Chester's black rhinoceros project is honestly one of the best rhinoceros projects out there that works with them both in and ex situ. For example; look at how much space they dedicate for breeding paddocks instead of filling them with other animals.
As well as that last year they basically lead a reintroduction of five black rhinos from several zoos across the globe. I don't know what Beauval does for reintroductions. Other than your Bearded vultures, however as mentioned before, I don't think that one counts for the this cup's topic.

If you ask me what matters most with conservation projects, is to look at which zoo works both in and ex-situ and has reintroduction programmes going on. As those are after all the endgoal for conservation species in zoos; reintroducing them.

 

[amur leopard]

Also just want to clear something up about the variety of species in the category in question.

Chester
Aardvark
African wild dog
Asiatic lion (doubtful)
Cape hyrax
Cape porcupine
Capybara
Common warthog
Dwarf mongoose
Eastern black rhinoceros
Giant anteater
Greater One-horned rhinoceros
Grevy's zebra
Kirk's dik-dik
Meerkat
Naked mole-rat
Onager
Red duiker
Roan antelope
Rothschild's giraffe
Round-eared elephant shrew
South American tapir
South-East Asian elephant (doubtful)
Southern pudu
Sub-sharan pygmy mouse
Sudan cheetah
Western sitatunga

Beauval:
African savanna elephant
African wild dog
Axis deer
Barbary macaque
Beisa oryx
Black sable antelope
Blackbuck
Blue wildebeest
Capybara
Common hog deer
Puma
Dwarf mongoose
Giant anteater
Greater One-horned rhinoceros
Grevy's zebra
Hanuman grey langur
Indian crested porcupine
Kirk's dik-dik
Large hairy armadillo
Lion
Meerkat
Naked mole rat
Nilgai
North Persian leopard
Nyala
Patagonian mara
Patas monkey
Red kangaroo
Red lechwe
Reeves' muntjac
Reticulated giraffe
Round-eared elephant shrew
Serval
Somali wild ass
South African bat-eared fox
South African cheetah
South American tapir
Southern lesser kudu
Southern three-banded armadillo
Southern white rhinoceros
Spotted hyena
Springbok
Western sitatunga
Western woylie (doubtful)

That's 44-26 to Beauval. No idea where you got 35-29 from?

Returning to the matter of exhibitry inside the zoos themselves, however, I do think that Beauval tries to embody the savanna atmosphere especially more than Chester and does a better job of this. The entire top half of the zoo and much of the South western corner is devoted to this biome. Theming links the areas together. The grass is green and lush unlike in Chester, where it is mostly downtrodden and overgrazed, providing a better atmosphere for the visitors as well as of course natural and healthy graze for large herbivores. The elephants at Beauval permanently have access to 25000 m2 of space, which is considerably larger than the much lauded rhinoceros exhibit at Chester and many times larger than the elephant exhibit at Chester, which looks desertified for a species that lives predominantly in thick and lush rainforest.
Beauval's lion exhibit is easily better even if we are counting Chester's lion exhibit, given that Asiatic lions are much more attributed with forest than grassland. Antelope exhibits are larger and lusher and easier to view from a visitor perspective. The Asiatic plains exhibit is immense at 17000 m2 and unrivalled by anything Chester can offer for its Asian ungulates.

Overall, inside the zoo, Beauval clearly wins.

 

[TeaLovingDave]

That's 44-26 to Beauval. No idea where you got 35-29 from?

I'll go into it properly when at the laptop again (which may be after the round ends, now) but two points quickly:

Asiatic lion (doubtful)

given that Asiatic lions are much more attributed with forest than grassland.

The relictual range in the Gir Forest from the last century does not mean the taxon isn't valid for grassland and desert biome, given the species was found throughout the Middle East and Indian Subcontinent until the 19th century and early 20th century. I believe the last non-Gir record was a female in Iran in the 1940s.

In any case I believe that the Gir area does also include dry grassland regions too, though someone more familiar with the area (I think Chli may have visited?) could correct me.

The grass is green and lush unlike in Chester, where it is mostly downtrodden and overgrazed,

I honestly can't understand how you are able to claim Chester's exhibits are mostly downtrodden and overgrazed, yet insist quite vociferously that to claim the same of the significantly worse exhibits at Montpellier is a lie....

Compare ..

 

[amur leopard]

I honestly can't understand how you are able to claim Chester's exhibits are mostly downtrodden and overgrazed, yet insist quite vociferously that to claim the same of the significantly worse exhibits at Montpellier is a lie....

This tie is not about Montpellier at all. It doesn't matter what I think about Montpellier. That changes nothing to the fact that most of Chester's exhibits are much less visually appealing and green than Beauval's. You probably chose to use Montpellier because you couldn't find a photo of Beauval looking downtrodden and overgrazed. Well here is another comparison ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

[TZDugong]

This tie is not about Montpellier at all. It doesn't matter what I think about Montpellier.

I think @TeaLovingDave is speaking more to the fact that you are calling Chester's exhibits overgrazed (when they really aren't), yet when talking about Montpellier's objectively overgrazed exhibit you argue that it is not overgrazed. It's a matter of consistency and it seems that you are just trying to twist your arguments and stances to say that Beauval deserves to win (although I agree that Beauval is a very strong contender in this category and that they have very lush exhibits).

The Lion enclosure comparison isn't a very fair one considering Chester's Lion exhibit is very new, and thus obviously the vegetation hasn't fully grown in. That's also Beauval's Nyala enclosure, not the Lion exhibit.

As for my own thoughts, I currently am going 2-1 Chester, although I'd agree with others in saying that this is pretty much a tie. Chester wins for me because of the excellent Rhino complex but also because all of Beauval's enclosures feel very similar to each other, while Chester seems to have more styles of exhibitry as well as animals from 3 different continents.

 

[amur leopard]

Beauval's enclosures feel very similar to each other, while Chester seems to have more styles of exhibitry as well as animals from 3 different continents.

Beauval has animals from 4 different continents?

As fir the others, the lion exhibit is very different from the, say, savanna exhibit. I don't feel the same way as you really. Chester has many large, plain hoofstock exhibits but Beauval has varied ways of exhibiting their animals in this category, more varied than Chester I would argue. I would also argue that Beauval's species provide a much better cross section of the biome in question than in Chester.

As a side note several of the cheetahs are now living in this exhibit, not in the larger one. This exhibit previously held Pallas' cats and before that Servals.

 

[TZDugong]

Beauval has animals from 4 different continents?

In this category? I only see animals from one continent: Africa

As fir the others, the lion exhibit is very different from the, say, savanna exhibit. I don't feel the same way as you really. Chester has many large, plain hoofstock exhibits but Beauval has varied ways of exhibiting their animals in this category, more varied than Chester I would argue.

Obviously the enclosures are different, but I really don't see how they are that different:

Whereas Chester's exhibitory style seems to be much more varied. For instance here are two photos, the first is the Indian Rhino exhibit and the second is an Onager exhibit:

 

[amur leopard]

Beauval:
African savanna elephant
African wild dog
Axis deer
Barbary macaque
Beisa oryx
Black sable antelope
Blackbuck
Blue wildebeest
Capybara
Common hog deer
Puma
Dwarf mongoose
Giant anteater
Greater One-horned rhinoceros
Grevy's zebra
Hanuman grey langur
Indian crested porcupine
Kirk's dik-dik
Large hairy armadillo
Lion
Meerkat
Naked mole rat
Nilgai
North Persian leopard
Nyala
Patagonian mara
Patas monkey
Red kangaroo
Red lechwe
Reeves' muntjac
Reticulated giraffe
Round-eared elephant shrew
Serval
Somali wild ass
South African bat-eared fox
South African cheetah
South American tapir
Southern lesser kudu
Southern three-banded armadillo
Southern white rhinoceros
Spotted hyena
Springbok
Western sitatunga
Western woylie

In this category? I only see animals from one continent: Africa

No? I see species from 4 continents on that list...

As for variation, why does being varied matter? If an enclosure represents the natural environment of the animal in question, why is that not enough?

You also seem to have brought up another point. The rhinos at Beauval regularly browse off of the natural plants around their enclosure, whereas the lack of natural food in Chester's enclosure means that they have to eat from a cattle feeder. In my view that kind of variation is not good...

 

[TZDugong]

No? I see species from 4 continents on that list...

Ah okay, just literally all the photos provided were for African animals.

As for variation, why does being varied matter? If an enclosure represents the natural environment of the animal in question, why is that not enough?

Because seeing the same (or very similar) enclosures over and over gets boring. It's the same thing as eating the same food every single day, the food may taste very good, but if you've had it too much it no longer interests you. A lot of Beauval's exhibits seem very similar, and while they look like very good exhibits, I'll take Chester's different exhibit styles (and good exhibits) any day of the week. Simply representing an animals habitat doesn't necessarily mean it's a good exhibit imo.

 

[TeaLovingDave]

You probably chose to use Montpellier because you couldn't find a photo of Beauval looking downtrodden and overgrazed.

I think @TeaLovingDave is speaking more to the fact that you are calling Chester's exhibits overgrazed (when they really aren't), yet when talking about Montpellier's objectively overgrazed exhibit you argue that it is not overgrazed. It's a matter of consistency and it seems that you are just trying to twist your arguments and stances to say that Beauval deserves to win

Yes, @TZDugong understands my point precisely - you've specifically made a point of denying that particular Montpellier exhibit was overgrazed, so it serves as a direct comparison to your stance on Chester's exhibits.

Well here is another comparison ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Again, @TZDugong makes the point for me - you're highlighting a new exhibit where the soil has yet to settle, vegetation has yet to grow and which has only ever been photographed in winter, all caveats that have already been noted. Moreover, it's a lion exhibit and was built on previously undeveloped land, so has never been grazed let alone overgrazed

As a side note several of the cheetahs are now living in this exhibit, not in the larger one. This exhibit previously held Pallas' cats and before that Servals.

Not actually true - on a few counts. Firstly, cheetahs are indeed moving into the exhibit during building work.... but this has not happened yet. Secondly, that exhibit has never held Pallas Cat

You also seem to have brought up another point. The rhinos at Beauval regularly browse off of the natural plants around their enclosure, whereas the lack of natural food in Chester's enclosure means that they have to eat from a cattle feeder. In my view that kind of variation is not good...

Being provided a cattle feeder does not equal *having* to eat from a cattle feeder - I've seen both species of rhinoceros at Chester eating elsewhere in their enclosures, and otherwise.

 

[TeaLovingDave]

Anyhow, the round is over and the die is cast we've both argued well and managed to convince the voting base to fit a closer and fairer result than initially seemed likely - so well-debated @amur leopard

 

[Brum]

Anyhow, the round is over and the die is cast

Unfortunately I've only just caught up with this thread, and after reading the previous discussion I was moved to change my vote. Turns out I was too late anyway, and should have got to the end of the thread first...

For what it's worth, I don't regret my vote, just wish I'd have had a bit more free time earlier to catch up.

 

[TeaLovingDave]

, just wish I'd have had a bit more free time earlier to catch up.

I imagine you were catching up.....on your weekly intake of beer

 

[amur leopard]

previously undeveloped land, so has never been grazed let alone overgrazed

Just a last point though. The reason I chose that comparison is because the Montpellier enclosure was on previously undeveloped land as well, so it was just as fair a comparison.

Anyway, very well debated and see you in the next one