Walrus currently in captivity

Westcoastperson said:
I guess not currently but in 2018 I explicitly remember Mitik having two different tusk covers.
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Very true! He recently had his left tusk extracted after struggling with an infection for several months while at Point Defiance, and the other is uncapped currently. Caps in general are often added and removed pretty frequently, it can be hard to keep up :D
 
If you are so keen on investigating walruses in zoos, you could check what helps breeding and avoiding tusk damage, something which is poorly known. Tusk caps are rather an emergency / veterinary measure.

Soft-bottom pools, large pools and pools with gentle sloping exit were suggested to help protecting tusks of walruses. Also, it would be interesting whether in recent years more walrus have tusks than in earlier years (a progress is being made)? And at what age males and females breed, and is there a link to larger group size?
 
Jurek7 said:
If you are so keen on investigating walruses in zoos, you could check what helps breeding and avoiding tusk damage, something which is poorly known. Tusk caps are rather an emergency / veterinary measure.

Soft-bottom pools, large pools and pools with gentle sloping exit were suggested to help protecting tusks of walruses. Also, it would be interesting whether in recent years more walrus have tusks than in earlier years (a progress is being made)? And at what age males and females breed, and is there a link to larger group size?
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This topic is one that is frequently asked about but with no real conclusive data behind the discussions until now. Every aspect of it is interesting and worth learning about -- tusk caps included. ;) (Regarding your other query, I also made a rather extensive post only a day or two ago detailing a few of the efforts that have been attempted and proposed to improve reproduction, but it's definitely something I'd like to discuss more in depth here later on).

Tusk caps are not always applied on an emergency basis -- they're often used as early as possible with calves to prevent tusk damage, to keep them from being ground down, and to keep existing damage from becoming infected. Veterinary, yes, but a critical aspect of the topic.

Environmental altercations, as stated before, have had limited effect due to walruses destructive nature. Habitats lined with soft materials have been attempted (and destroyed), but I'm not certain about substrate use -- this may have been in use at Hagenbeck and Harderwijk, can anyone confirm/deny? That would be fascinating!

I'm not sure how effective these habitat modifications have been, I'd definitely love to see any data available on this (I only know that in parks where these efforts are present, tusks are still being damaged and extracted). If I were to give my opinion, it seems to be largely, or at least significantly, individually behavioral -- the same parks that have animals with pristine, exemplary tusks always have animals raised alongside them or in the exact same environment that have required extractions, or otherwise extensively damaged their tusks. Tusk damage and removal also occurs at an incredibly higher rate in cows compared to bulls, and I'm not sure why. I will definitely be asking about this!

As for your last questions, both bulls and cows will most commonly conceive their first offspring at age 10 -- the youngest cow to conceive was 6, and the youngest bulls sired offspring at age 9. Spermatogenesis in bulls has been documented as beginning at age 5 in one instance.

I'm not sure if there's a tangible link to larger herd size and increased reproductive success, though this is certainly natural and strongly promoted among modern breeding facilities -- parks with larger herds have had more calves conceived, but this comes with the territory of having more cows to produce said pregnancies. Several of the most successful parks in the world have only housed breeding pairs, and the most widespread and reproductively successful (and consistent) walrus lineage in the world today originated from a single breeding pair which was self-enclosed without outbreeding for three generations until the founder bull died.
 
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csartie said:
This topic is one that is frequently asked about but with no real conclusive data behind the discussions until now.
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That is why I suggested checking :) since somebody has a database of all walruses.

csartie said:
Habitats lined with soft materials have been attempted (and destroyed)
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Because walruses feed by sucking molluscs out of shells, so have enormously powerful tongue, together with an instinctive urge to use it. So they suck out the soft lining of pools.

csartie said:
If I were to give my opinion, it seems to be largely, or at least significantly, individually behavioral -- the same parks that have animals with pristine, exemplary tusks always have animals raised alongside them or in the exact same environment that have required extractions, or otherwise extensively damaged their tusks.
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Well, that can mean that some walruses were transferred from different conditions. It can also mean that the pool is generally dangerous, but some animals are lucky and avoid damage. I wonder if there is an institution where all walruses kept their tusks?
 
Jurek7 said:
That is why I suggested checking :) since somebody has a database of all walruses.
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I hope you won't take offense at me pointing out the assumptions you seem to be making in your last two responses -- you assume that I have no experience with this species, that I'm sharing information that isn't thoroughly researched and factual, etc. Absolutely no offense meant, I'm very sorry that I seem to have given you those impressions and if you'd like to message me privately I'm very curious as to what lead you to believe those assumptions to be true, I'd like to avoid such situations in the future. :)

Jurek7 said:
Because walruses feed by sucking molluscs out of shells, so have enormously powerful tongue, together with an instinctive urge to use it. So they suck out the soft lining of pools.
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Correct! This is why I mentioned the destruction of the linings; because you mentioned them as a possible detractant to tusk wear, and I was explaining why they haven't thus far proven to be effective. They're simply destroyed, very unfortunately!

Jurek7 said:
Well, that can mean that some walruses were transferred from different conditions.
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Though this is certainly the case for many herds, the examples I was specifically referencing were --
csartie said:
"animals raised alongside them or in the exact same environment"
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For the final question --
Jurek7 said:
I wonder if there is an institution where all walruses kept their tusks?
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Unfortunately this doesn't seem to be the case! That would be incredible if there were; I'd love to know their secrets. But unfortunately no such facility has ever existed, unless you include facilities that have only housed one or two animals across their entire history (and even then, examples are few and often temporary housing situations).
 
Unfortunately this doesn't seem to be the case! That would be incredible if there were; I'd love to know their secrets. But unfortunately no such facility has ever existed, unless you include facilities that have only housed one or two animals across their entire history (and even then, examples are few and often temporary housing situations).
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Kamogawa Seaworld. All their animals have tusks.
 
csartie said:
Mukku did not ;)
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Well she's dead, and of the current group of five animals, four have tusks, and the last one is too young to have any yet. So by definition, they are a facility where all of their animals have tusks. Of course after typing that, I've now reread the question and see that the question was referring to the facilities entire history. So, Kamogawa would not meet that. However that said, they are probably still the closest to having almost every animal retain their tusks.
 
2 year old Fiete at Tierpark Hagenbeck has been battling a tusk infection. I wouldn't be surprised if they were to be extracted in the near future. Hopefully he'll be able to recover from the infection and come through in good health :)
 
27-year-old cow Uquq has died at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom. The facility no longer houses walruses after the death of her and 9-year-old Pakak on March 4th of this year.
 
Great Argus said:
Oof. Both only moved there at the start of this year.
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Yes, two deaths in 4 months for walruses that just arrived 8 months ago, it's an overwhelming loss for the population and for everyone involved with these animals. A lot of concerns are being raised about Six Flags.

Her health had been up and down since she returned to Vallejo -- she was meant to return to SeaWorld San Diego around July 4th after Pakak died, but the transfer was postponed due to her health.

It's a tragic and unfortunate situation.
 
@csartie since you know so much about the captive population, do you know what breeding plans there are for the walrus currently in the US?
 
Animals R AMAZING! said:
@csartie since you know so much about the captive population, do you know what breeding plans there are for the walrus currently in the US?
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Not much, unfortunately. There's a heavy focus on having every single reproductive female in breeding situations each mating season (which is a given, I'd say). Efforts are being made to identify and acquire surplus captive-born animals from non-AZA facilities, and there's a goal to have at least two females artificially inseminated in the next five years, and also to train the bulls for semen collections. Semen is also being sought for import from non-AZA facilities, this has been ongoing for the last few years (Aquarium du Quebec's bull Boris is trained for semen collection, as well as Yokohama Hakkeijima Sea Paradise's bull Seita; I'm unsure of any others, though I'm confident they exist). Institutional commitment among AZA facilities is incredibly strong despite 3.5 deaths per birth in the last six years; numbers which are a marked improvement from previous years' data.

Interestingly, the 2020 TAG report mentions "one new institution with a walrus compliant facility is
ready to receive animals". I'm completely baffled as to who this could be. My best guess is Toronto, although I was told the renovation of their polar bear habitat to accommodate walrus was postponed due to COVID. Hainan Ocean Paradise claims to have been built to AZA standards, and they are indeed a new facility ready to receive animals, but they're not listed on the website as being accredited. Same for Pairi Daiza, although they've acquired plenty of stock since the publishing of that document lol. Does anyone know which park this references?

Back to the topic at hand, I know the information I provided regarding breeding plans is very generalized and nonspecific so I apologize for not having further details to give you. :oops: Breeding season is right around the corner and we'll be sure to learn more the closer it gets.
 
I wouldn't think the TAG is referring to a non-US institution considering the MMPA means they cannot import any animals from the wild or from other countries, meaning any animals we sent out of the country are completely lost to our breeding program. That is, unless the regulations around Walruses are less strict than those around Polar Bears and cetaceans?

~Thylo
 
ThylacineAlive said:
I wouldn't think the TAG is referring to a non-US institution considering the MMPA means they cannot import any animals from the wild or from other countries, meaning any animals we sent out of the country are completely lost to our breeding program. That is, unless the regulations around Walruses are less strict than those around Polar Bears and cetaceans?

~Thylo
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I'm not as familiar with the MMPA as I should be, but I do know that cetaceans and walruses alike can and have been imported both from the wild and from other countries, with permits. I believe? that polar bear's (+ sea otters, + manatees, + monk seals, etc) additional restrictions come from the ESA (someone please correct me if I'm wrong, I'm very much out of my depth and speaking off the top of my head here)! Walruses however, definitely still being imported from other countries. It's being considered necessary at this point if the population is to have any hope of continuing, and imports are being heavily pursued.

My initial assumption was that the TAG was referencing a US-based facility as well, but I just can't think of any that could possibly fit that criteria! There are several examples outside of the US which could be plausible, however, which is why I mainly brought those up.
 
Five 3-year-old walruses are being transferred to the Moscow Zoo from Aquatoria Yalta today.
 
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