Artis Royal Zoo Historical notes from Artis

A very rare species which has been kept at Artis but for which I failed to find any information exept the newspaper-article from 1928 was a single White uakari ( Cacajao calvus ).
ZTL only list 4 European collections which have kept the species in the past ( Frankfurt, Gelsenkirchen, Cologne and London ) but a newspaper-article in a Dutch newspaper from August 1928 clearly discribed the arrival of a White uakari which was caught on the border from Brazil and Peru near the Japura river. No information on how long the species lived at Artis could be found by me... :(.
 
And again a rare species for which there are no records in the "general Zoo-literature" - even Zootierliste don't mention it.
2 Giant coots were recieved Nov. 1967 and at that moment only 2 other zoos were keeping this species ( ologne and San Diego ). It's not know to me if the 2 birds were a pair and also not how long they lived at Artis.

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( this photo was made at Weltvogelpark Walsrode 1986 )
 
If we should believe ZooTierListe the Toad-headed turtle ( Mesoclemmys gibba ) has always been a very rare species in European zoos with only 4 former keepers and 2 current keepers.
Artis is not mentioned at all in this list but this is not correct.
In the early 20th centuary it even was kept in quite good numbers at Artis and for 1908 I found the following donations of this species to Artis :
- March 1908 - 1 donated
- August 1908 - 7 donated
- October 1908 - 1 donated
( Surninam was at that time a Dutch colony and several Dutch persons send with some regularity animals to their homeland )
1936 it even became better and one of the females laid eggs and one of these eggs even hatched and the young survived. I'm quite sure this must have been the World-first-breeding of this species !
 
Did some more searching and found also a note that 2 Toad-headed turtles were recieved during May 1910 and a note that the breeding-animals in 1936 were kept in the same enclosure which also was home to the Komodo dragon !
 
That Artis kept an Aye aye is well-known because the specimen kept from June 1914 till Sept. 1937 hold ( or still held ) the longivity record of 23 years in captivity.
This animal was kept in a cage which was not public so only very few people have ever seen this animal.
Less well-known is that Artis had kept the species already before this "famous" specimen. 2 animals were revieved in August 1886 and were put of public display in the Monkey House ( althrough I don't think they showed themselfs very often ). Couldn't find any more information about these 2 animals so don't know how long they were kept alive...

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Does anybody here has more information about Shoebills at Artis in the 1970ty years ? I need to know until when they were kept there. Unfortunately, there are no detailed informations on Zootierliste, only"until at the beginning of the 80ty's. And the Zoo gudies are not helpful-no shoebill in them, and no guide was published between 1974 and 1986.
 
Yes I have :).
Artis obtained 2 shoebills Oct. 1971 for the price of Dutch guldens 12.500.
One of them died 1979 or 1980 and after it died ( sex unknown to me ) the other bird ( a male ) was exchanged with another male from Frankfurt Zoo which had been kept there since 1967.
The male send to Frankfurt died there in the spring of 1981 and the Frankfurt male which was now at Artis died 1982.
I remember the last one was kept in a relative small enclosure on the place were now the Lemur walk-through island is.
Hopes this helps you a little bit.
 
Some more information about Shoebills at Artis :

The first specimen was kept at the end of the 1890s / beginning of the 1900s but sofar I could not find any more information about this specimen.
In 1953 3 specimens - among them a surtain pair - arrived at Artis but also from these birds any further information is not avaible to me.
Didn't find any other notes about shoebills at Artis and I'm quite surtain that these were all the birds kept at Artis.

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2 of the 3 birds which arrived 1953 ( photo made 1954 ) - Archieve vogelcommando
 

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Wow, phantastic infomation-that helps a lot, even a photo. Thank you very much, Vogelcommando ! You should thell this to Zootierliste, so they can update their information .

Maybe you als know, what zoo and birdparks scurrently keep shoebills outside of Europe ? I only know Uenoo-Zoo Tokio, Jurong Bird Park Singapur, Lowry Park Zoo Tampa and San Diego Wild Animal Park, maybe Dallas World Aquarium ?, and maybe also Al Wabra, but they are closed.
 
vogelcommando said:
Some more information about Shoebills at Artis :

The first specimen was kept at the end of the 1890s / beginning of the 1900s but sofar I could not find any more information about this specimen.
In 1953 3 specimens - among them a surtain pair - arrived at Artis but also from these birds any further information is not avaible to me.
Didn't find any other notes about shoebills at Artis and I'm quite surtain that these were all the birds kept at Artis.

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2 of the 3 birds which arrived 1953 ( photo made 1954 ) - Archieve vogelcommando
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I remember them well, probably some of my first experiences of zoos in general. The area held cassowary too.

I guess the general public never realised how unique exhibition of these birds is/was. I am convinced they featured in one of the older zoo magazines and certainly the old encyclopedia.
 
Bib Fortuna said:
Wow, phantastic infomation-that helps a lot, even a photo. Thank you very much, Vogelcommando ! You should thell this to Zootierliste, so they can update their information .

Maybe you als know, what zoo and birdparks scurrently keep shoebills outside of Europe ? I only know Uenoo-Zoo Tokio, Jurong Bird Park Singapur, Lowry Park Zoo Tampa and San Diego Wild Animal Park, maybe Dallas World Aquarium ?, and maybe also Al Wabra, but they are closed.
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Created a new thread for shoebills in captivity :) : Shoebills in captivity
 
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And here is my next qustion. Does anybody knows, why Artis has stopped keeping Black Wildebeest in 2013 oder 2014 ?

I guess, they had trouble with the Grevy-Zebras ?

Where they have send the gnus ? No infomation on Zootierliste...
 
vogelcommando said:
And again a rare species for which there are no records in the "general Zoo-literature" - even Zootierliste don't mention it.
2 Giant coots were recieved Nov. 1967 and at that moment only 2 other zoos were keeping this species ( ologne and San Diego ). It's not know to me if the 2 birds were a pair and also not how long they lived at Artis.

View attachment 380973
( this photo was made at Weltvogelpark Walsrode 1986 )
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Apparently Delacour attempted to establish a pair on the lake at Cleres, under the impression that they were flightless. They weren't.
 
Bib Fortuna said:
And here is my next qustion. Does anybody knows, why Artis has stopped keeping Black Wildebeest in 2013 oder 2014 ?

I guess, they had trouble with the Grevy-Zebras ?

Where they have send the gnus ? No infomation on Zootierliste...
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Black Wildebeest are wonderful, charismatic animals. They can also be very 'difficult' with other animals and with each other.
 
FBBird said:
Black Wildebeest are wonderful, charismatic animals. They can also be very 'difficult' with other animals and with each other.
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The Artis wildebeest did not mix well with zebra. For a time they were still kept in the old maned wolf grottoes. Do not know where they were transferred to when leaving the collection.
 
FBBird said:
Black Wildebeest are wonderful, charismatic animals. They can also be very 'difficult' with other animals and with each other.
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They are not more diffcult in mixed exhibits than zebras-they cause the most problems than all antelopes together....

Well, aggressive gnubulls are only a zoomade-problem, but even the wildest gnu male is nothing in compare to a male chimpanzee who has really got into a rage, even an angry Gnubull acts like a tired two-horned chameleon ..:)
 
Bib Fortuna said:
They are not more diffcult in mixed exhibits than zebras-they cause the most problems than all antelopes together....

Well, aggressive gnubulls are only a zoomade-problem, but even the wildest gnu male is nothing in compare to a male chimpanzee who has really got into a rage, even an angry Gnubull acts like a tired two-horned chameleon ..:)
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Given the limited space on the Artis African Savannah mixing gnu and zebra was a no starter. If it had been 5ha - which is completely out of the question in this city zoo - it would never have been an issue (safe for when their are calves of one or other species).
 
An yet another very rarely kept species which has been in the collection of Artis : the Cuban macaw ( Ara tricolor ) a species which now is extinct.
In a list of parrot-species kept at Artis it's mentioned that one specimen was kept at the Zoo before 1863 and on ZTL I found it died indeed a little earlier ( 1858 ).
From another source ( Bull. BOC - vol 113 (2) pp. 125-156 ) I discovered that the species was traded with some regularity during the 1800s to Europe.
The Artis specimen was preserved and seem to be now at the Natural History Museum in Stockholm ( Sweden ).

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