Edinburgh Zoo Edinburgh Zoo News 2023

Update from yesterday visit:

• Both koala joeys seen again today- they are much larger than when I last saw them

• Living links west has new climbing frames complete in the indoor areas


• Living links east is closed off as they are renovating the indoor areas

• The two binturongs were fighting a bit

• The now mature hairy armadillo that was born last year which is in the old dwarf mongoose enclosure was seen for the first time by me today

• The viewing area for the Hairy armadillos is now open, although still no sign of any

• There doesn’t seem to be any construction on a new zebra enclosure

• The zebras were running around their paddock a lot

• The red bellied lemurs in the walk through were outside for once, and in one of the trees

• The former monkey walkthrough is still closed

• All 4 dik diks were very active
 
A few updates from tonights AGM:

  • The zoo are close to signing agreements in regards to the replacement species for the Giant Panda's. As mentioned in a previous post it's likely that current Zebra enclosure will be incorporated into this new species development. It is anticipated that the new species will arrive in June/July 2024.
  • There is no fixed date yet for the Giant Panda's departure however when they do depart the Koala's will be moved into the Panda's current enclosure while there area is refurbished. Upon completion of the Koala refurbishment and when the Koala's have returned to their own enclosure, it was mentioned the Gelada's may also move into Panda's current enclosure to allow a refurbishment of there enclosure. So these refurbishments are likely to take place before June/July 2024.
  • It was confirmed the Drills should be on show within the next 2 weeks.
  • There are plans in place to bring in a new Vicuna herd to HWP. Also at HWP the Eurasian Cranes have had a new enclosure built and the Red Panda's are also getting a new enclosure built.
  • The zoo are also planning to build a new Rhino enclosure in the future although no specific timeline for this was mentioned.
  • The Saki Monkey Walkthrough, which is currently empty, is likely going to be turned into a "Quiet Place" garden area.
 
Thanks for posting the above, I took some notes also but you’ve summed it up very well.

I thought it was a very good meeting and I’m glad they allowed extra time for other members questions etc , I was going to ask myself how much of the decision for the pandas to depart was of the RZSS and how much was it based on the Chinese and it appears to be the latter.

Im pleased that David addressed this and it appears the Zoo would have been willing to keep them longer, the Chinese delegation are arriving next month so I guess we’ll find out more then, as he said "its in the hands of the Chinese".

I did note how David seemed to be quite defensive when that one fellow asked a question about seeing empty enclosures (this has been a point of discussion on here in the past) , with David saying he prefers a “hollistic” approach to the Zoo - I can see where he’s coming from though.
 
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Apologies for posting here again but I felt this was also the most appropriate place to post this as it got me thinking.

One of the questions last night was regarding Enrichment in some of the exhibits, although in particular reference to the Pandas.

Without doubt they are treated extremely well and are happy at Edinburgh but David refuted this question strongly stating that they are trying to go for a more “natural approach” to the exhibit which explains why the Pandas don’t receive much enrichment when it comes to the form of toys etc, while other zoos do tend to provide things like balls for their pandas to play with.

I’m pretty certain YG & TT did have things like that when they were younger but not under the current leadership, I thought that the reason why they didn’t was on account of their age - I didn’t actually realise it was a conscious decision by the Zoo’s board.

Anyone have any thoughts about enrichment such as this?

Of course - enrichment doesn’t just mean toys , YG&TT have an extremely large and generous variation of bamboo etc (arguably the most of any zoo) but the question posed seemed to hint towards toys etc, which apart from an occasional box of treats that YG receives (normally on his birthday or Christmas and he enjoys playing with the box as much as the treats) RZSS don’t seem to provide them much.

Maybe it’s a small detail to some, but I did also find David’s reaction to this interesting too.
 
GeeZee said:
It seems that when the Pandas depart they are going to move the Zebras & combine both the zebra and the panda enclosure for a new arrival… interesting
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That'll be quite a lot of space for whatever it is. My guess is a big cat that can make use of the panda's climbing structures, maybe Amur leopards?
 
Jambi said:
That'll be quite a lot of space for whatever it is. My guess is a big cat that can make use of the panda's climbing structures, maybe Amur leopards?
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Unsurprisingly they are keeping any details very close to their chests, the closest clue I got was when speaking to a Discovery Ranger who said something along the lines of the new animal "wont be as interesting as a panda, but it will be as equally endangered" - so perhaps an Amur Leopard isn't a bad guess , I do know they were at HWP until recently.

Although personally (while in my view you cant beat a Panda) I think it would be a good enclosure for an ape, perhaps an Orang Utang, I dont believe we've seen them in Edinburgh for a very long time, even better if it was one of the rarer variants such as the Tapanuli (as opposed to the more common Borneo seen at some other zoos).
 
GeeZee said:
Unsurprisingly they are keeping any details very close to their chests, the closest clue I got was when speaking to a Discovery Ranger who said something along the lines of the new animal "wont be as interesting as a panda, but it will be as equally endangered" - so perhaps an Amur Leopard isn't a bad guess , I do know they were at HWP until recently.

Although personally (while in my view you cant beat a Panda) I think it would be a good enclosure for an ape, perhaps an Orang Utang, I dont believe we've seen them in Edinburgh for a very long time, even better if it was one of the rarer variants such as the Tapanuli (as opposed to the more common Borneo seen at some other zoos).
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The 2022 Animal inventory for HWP lists 0.3 Amur leopard as still being at the park, when you say they were up at HWP until recently, have they now left the collection?
 
Baringogiraffe12 said:
The 2022 Animal inventory for HWP lists 0.3 Amur leopard as still being at the park, when you say they were up at HWP until recently, have they now left the collection?
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There were plans to release them back to the wild a few years ago but I don’t know if these came to fruition or not if I’m honest, perhaps they are still there, they were off show for a while too prior to that.

Rare leopard cub born in Highlands - BBC News
 
GeeZee said:
There were plans to release them back to the wild a few years ago but I don’t know if these came to fruition or not if I’m honest, perhaps they are still there, they were off show for a while too prior to that.

Rare leopard cub born in Highlands - BBC News
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The Amur Leopard program at HWP has been halted, as they had not been able to get permission to live feed. RZSS did apply to Defra, but this was turned down. I had a tour of Highland with one of the Saving Wildcat team earlier in the year, and they told me that the Leopard program wasn't being continued up there. I'm sure they said they had two currently there, but were awaiting moves for one. The father of the 2018 cub, went to the BCS and has subsequently gone to a Zoo in Belgium.
They had also hoped to live feed the Wildcats for the release program, but again this request was rejected. 20 Wildcats are due to be released next month.
 
The Royal Zoological Society of Scotland (RZSS) has shared the first photos of a tiny baby L’Hoest’s monkey born at Edinburgh Zoo to parents Sheli and Jamal. Born on 8 May 2023, the youngster will receive their first health checks from expert vets at the wildlife conservation charity in the coming weeks and will be named by keepers shortly after:

Baby L’Hoest’s monkey born at Edinburgh Zoo | Edinburgh Zoo
 
Rajang21 said:
Of course the common, critically endangered, Bornean orangutan. Where do you suppose they would source Tapanuli orangutan?
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With great difficulty I'm sure, the Tapanuli was more wishful thinking on my part - but it would supplement the Tigers quite well as they are located in a similar area of Sumatra.

I don't believe they are found at any zoo in the UK/Europe afterall.
 
GeeZee said:
With great difficulty I'm sure, the Tapanuli was more wishful thinking on my part - but it would supplement the Tigers quite well as they are located in a similar area of Sumatra.

I don't believe they are found at any zoo in the UK/Europe afterall.
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There are none outside the native range.
 
GeeZee said:
With great difficulty I'm sure, the Tapanuli was more wishful thinking on my part - but it would supplement the Tigers quite well as they are located in a similar area of Sumatra.

I don't believe they are found at any zoo in the UK/Europe afterall.
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Not just that - nowhere in captivity.
And I'm not entirely sure of the import of a large, endangered, intelligent mammal would be easiest thing to do ...
 
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