Knowsley Safari Park Knowsley Safari Park news 2022
- Thread starter Keelan
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It’s a female calf born to mom, Meru! This is her 11th calf! I was hoping the mother would be one of the younger females but this is great news nonetheless.
Rare white rhino born at safari park - BBC News
Who knows perhaps more of the females are pregnant. As far as I'm aware they younger females (Keeva and Bayami I think they are called) have never had a calf but they get on well with meru. Perhaps the plan is for them to learn motherhood from meru before they have a calf of there own. But great news of any rhino birth and let's hope more to come in the near future
As you know Knowsley has had two males on site in recent years. Sharka (30 years old) who has previously fathered 5 Rhino (all at Knowsley), 1 with Winnie, 1 with Piglet and 3 with Meru. Pembe (13 years old) being the other male who has been at Knowsley for 3 years who has not previously fathered any offspring. As previously documented in this thread he has spent the last 6 months or so at the Elephant house due to his challenging behaviour and I’m unsure if there are any plans for him to return to the drive.
I haven’t seen any confirmation of who the father of this youngster is but it wouldn’t surprise me if it is Sharka as Meru has always been his favourite.
I believe that Sharka initially showed little interest in mating with the two younger females (Bayami & Keeva). Pembe I believe did mate with the two youngsters Bayami and Keeva when he was on the Safari drive (but so far that hasn’t proved to be successful).
The good news is that Sharka is now showing an interest in the younger Rhino’s (as evidenced from a recent post on Social media showing him mating with Bayami). This is obviously very encouraging news for the breeding programme at Knowsley as Sharka is a successful breeding male who is yet to be overrepresented genetically.
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That's great news that he is showing interest in younger females. Hopefully then this birth will be followed by more from the younger females or even winnie and piglet. If pembe doesn't move back up to the safari drive will the park keep him or will he be moved on. I have never personally seen him in the former elephant enclosure. Is he an aggressive individual or just challengimg to control on the safari
I have never actually seen him at the elephant enclosure despite my best attempts at looking through and over fences but I know for a fact he was certainly still there a month or so ago. I’m not really sure why he’s deemed to be such a difficult individual (I have never seen him attack a car for example). I think Knowsley took him on as they had the space for a second male as they have two large paddocks.
I know that some animals are on long term loan as part of breeding programme (Bayami & Keeva being two such examples) whilst others are permanent park residents. If Pembe is on long term loan then I would imagine he will be switched out for another male if he is unable to contribute to the parks breeding programme. If however he arrived as part of the permanent collection it would make it difficult to move him on with him being a challenging teenage male with no track record of being able to successfully breed.
Where are Bayami and Keeva on loan from I thought they were long term residents. If pembe is a problem to have on the safari drive and he is a long term resident then coukd the females come to him. If Bayami and Keeva are settled up on the drive then potentially other young females could be brought in from other collections if any are available. This could then open to the public as a new rhino enclosure.
I believe they have been placed at Knowsley by the European breeding programme. If they successfully breed then they will likely remain at Knowsley for the rest of their lives.
The programme would however in the long look to relocate them to another location in Europe if they fail to successfully breed at Knowsley (if the failure to breed was not definitively due to infertility issues in the female).
If it could be categorically determined that the female was infertile then the animal would naturally leave the breeding programme and more than likely become a permanent resident at the park where they are settled.
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Had a quick visit up today at knowsley and not too much to note. Didn't see the baby rhino which was to be expected but the Door to one of the houses was open perhaps to allow them out if they want to. Also today I managed to see an Eland calf at just a few minutes old and saw it take its first steps. The Wildebeest were very interested. The only other thing is that the park are now getting ready for enchanted. Some of the lanterns are now being put in place.
The filming is being carried out by Blast films, who were the producers of “The Secret Life of the Zoo”. It is my understanding that it is now over 2 years since they last filmed at Chester, so it seems this will be a replacement for that series on Channel 4. They spent a lot of time filming people going around the Safari in August and have been extensively filming the animals and keepers over the last few months. When it makes it on to our TV screens it will hopefully provide a big boost to Knowsley.
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Yes this seems interesting cannot wait to see it. Will this programme just be about knowsley safari or a selection of other zoos if none knows. It will be nice to see a generally less major collection reach the limelight because so far there have only been shows about longleat Chester and london
Reading the advert it does seem to be more about families and people rather than focusing in the animals (I could be wrong) but I'm looking forward to seeing what the series has in store and hopefully see Knowsley in a new light
And Monkey World.... and Twycross.... and Colchester.... and Edinburgh.... and Highland Wildlife Park.... and the Aspinall collections..... and Crocodiles of the World..... and Cotswold Wildlife Park.....
I am 100% certain I am missing several, too!
I was only stating programmes that I can remember of the top of my head. I have never watched a program about most of these zoos you have stated. It was a passing comment to say it is nice to see a new place reach the limelight I was not going to go on a rampage of all the zoos which have had TV shows about them
Best to avoid the "there have only been" definitive statement then
For your general interest, the Edinburgh/HWP and Monkey World programmes are both active and still produced - so you should be able to track those down!