I would like London to follow the Plzen route, although perhaps concentrating more on smaller species, so they have adequate enclosures. Plzen has ABC species and XYZ species. It is also one of the very few zoos that doesn't keep meerkats.
ZSL London Zoo London Zoo discussion thread
- Thread starter Fallax
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Sorry, but I could not entirely agree with you for once. First, I miss some other zoos in your list that - although some are a little bigger - ranges sizewise in the "same league", but have more species like Frankfurt (no elephants but still rhinos), Karlsruhe or Budapest. Second, when fish and invertebrates species would also count, London Zoo would look even worse (And if someone come up with the argument, that London Zoo has not built a new aquarium on its grounds because there is already an aquarium in the city, then this isn't valid to me. Look at Vienna f. e., they have fish tanks in the Tiergarten and in Haus des Meeres. And Vienna is much smaller then (Greater) London. Beside that, some fish species need more space as some amphibians, reptiles or even mammals). And last but not least: An exhibit with Aquariums/fish tanks could also be built underground, which means, it won't be necessary to immolate surface space.
Kalaw
Well-Known Member
Fish, perhaps (and I agree with your statement that a new Aquarium at Regent's Park should be a priority for London at the moment) , but invertebrates certainly not. Although some are off-display, London houses 174 species of invertebrate, which is surely among the largest in Europe?
On an unrelated note, although several major city zoos across Europe do well to display megafauna in adequate exhibits, proving that it is possible, that doesn't mean that London should seek to mirror them so far as I am concerned. Using Antwerp as an example, its pinniped, buffalo, hippo, rhino and elephant enclosures are all adequate (assuming that the elephant extension is as big as I am informed, or else 'adequate' feels like a little bit of a stretch), and get the job done, but they are hardly exceptional, and considering how many excellent enclosures for those species are appearing in newer developments across the UK and everywhere else, do look a little mediocre.
Since many of these enclosures at Antwerp (except the rhinos, I believe) are quite old, I see no problem in leaving them untouched. But if a zoo were to build one of these exhibits from scratch, it would feel like a step in the wrong direction for exhibit quality at that zoo. Given that animal rights activists were one of the main reasons as to why London moved away from megafauna in the first place, I have a feeling that, were London to follow Antwerp's example, and try to display large mammals without considerable expansion, there would by public uproar.
Ref. Fish and invertebrates, I was probably unclear in this point. What I meant was "counting ALL exhibited species". Afaik, London Zoo has only an handful fish species now. Even when you add the indeed big amount of invertebrate species, e.g. Frankfurt and Basel would have a bigger total.
First things first: I completely agree that London Zoo would greatly benefit from a new aquarium, I guess it is probably not realistic, but aquariums are perfect for city zoos and London has such a history with them... While London is now lacking in fish (though not more so than Paris or Copenhagen), their invertebrate collection is still very good, especially for terrestrial invertebrates where probably only Berlin and Amsterdam can compete among the big city zoos.
The list of zoos to compare London with wasn't meant to be complete, though I must say I completely forgot about Frankfurt and that one would have made a nice comparison. Frankfurt does have way more mammals and a better reptile collection, but London has far more bird species. Frankfurt is a bit of a unique situation with the Grzimek house, but such displays are a way to increase diversity and the Clore can't really compare. I don't think Karlsruhe is a good comparison. And while Budapest might have all the diversity, it hasn't made any choice yet in their collection management as it clearly has too many animals in substandard enclosures, not a route London should be taking. Budapest is in that regard about 20 years behind...
Charles
Well-Known Member
What was the signs of further development?
You probably mean to defend London Zoo, but you are underscoring how bad it is. You pick weaker to weakest examples of zoos and exhibits, and say that London is similar to them. This type of "defense" looks like an eristic trick in discussion, unfortunately.
I like very much your listing of species number for London and other European zoos @lintworm . However, as you say, you picked weak zoos to compare, and just one characteristics. Comparing larger animals, London would be abysmally low.
By the way, I was interested in how much space a city zoo really needs to exhibit big animals. In summary - picking multiple examples of good mid-sized exhibits in European zoos vary from 1500m2 (a good pinniped pool) through 2500-4000m (bears, big cats) to 7000-9000m2 (a multispecies savanna with giraffes, zebras etc). A well designed zoo can fit most larger animals in good exhibits, together with visitor paths, greenery, restaurant etc, on 5-7 hectares of land - much less than London Zoo. I made it into a fantasy zoo thread, but it is based on real sizes.
https://www.zoochat.com/community/t...big-animals-not-cramped-nor-impoveris.486539/
Tetradactyla
Active Member
As always, very interesting to read through this discussion and see people's opinions.
I think cost will be a substantial barrier to London getting any kind of megafauna in the near future; after all, it was not that long ago (2020) that the zoo was allegedly facing permanent closure due to the shortfall caused by repeated COVID lockdowns - and, let's face it, it wasn't exactly in great financial condition before that! With the rising costs in... well, just about everything since then, I think new acquisitions for London are not going to be a matter of space or ambition, so much as the reality of the money needed to house, feed, and heat each species.
Any zoo's collection will be a matter of careful balance, with the ABCs funding the existance of the XYZs (like it or loathe it, the popularity of the Rainforest House with regular visitors very much helps "pay for" the night zone downstairs). Do I think London could stand to be a little more ambitious when it comes to displaying some taxa? Certainly. Do I envy them having to thread the needle on keeping species which are visible and active enough to hold a regular visitor's attention (a description which, much as I love them, does not apply to a lot of carnivores), whilst also being unusual enough to justify keeping, whilst also fitting into what is almost undoubtedly a very restrictive post-COVID financial model? Not at all, and I'm willing to cut them a little slack for not always getting it right.
I think cost will be a substantial barrier to London getting any kind of megafauna in the near future; after all, it was not that long ago (2020) that the zoo was allegedly facing permanent closure due to the shortfall caused by repeated COVID lockdowns - and, let's face it, it wasn't exactly in great financial condition before that! With the rising costs in... well, just about everything since then, I think new acquisitions for London are not going to be a matter of space or ambition, so much as the reality of the money needed to house, feed, and heat each species.
Any zoo's collection will be a matter of careful balance, with the ABCs funding the existance of the XYZs (like it or loathe it, the popularity of the Rainforest House with regular visitors very much helps "pay for" the night zone downstairs). Do I think London could stand to be a little more ambitious when it comes to displaying some taxa? Certainly. Do I envy them having to thread the needle on keeping species which are visible and active enough to hold a regular visitor's attention (a description which, much as I love them, does not apply to a lot of carnivores), whilst also being unusual enough to justify keeping, whilst also fitting into what is almost undoubtedly a very restrictive post-COVID financial model? Not at all, and I'm willing to cut them a little slack for not always getting it right.
With all due respect, a good section of this is just makes no sense. The fantasy zoo link you cite doesn’t appear to have any keeper areas at all, everything is squished together, there’s hardly any visitor amenities and you’re completely ignoring the fact that London (or any of the city zoos mentioned above) are not starting from a clean slate whatsoever. It’s honestly a complete strawman argument and I think you know it.
I think a lot of people are also working under the assumption London is a fountain of money? It’s being doing a lot better than it was during Covid for sure but it’s not got the funds to make massive changes at the blistering rate some on here seem to want. Doing something with the Mappins sounds easy but it probably involves either major works on the structure beneath and dealing with the aquarium, or knocking the entire thing down after a lot of paperwork and politics. It’s not a profitable move, at least not short term, and so for me I wouldn’t be surprised if nothing were done with it at all for another five-ten years as the zoo recovers from the impact of Covid etc. It’s all very easy to look at the area taken up by the zoo and say so and so could go here, but much harder and more useful to look at what is currently in place and consider developments from there. Drawing lines on a blank canvas as you have done could not be further from the reality London currently faces.
As for the supposed unfair comparisons, I personally think they’re very apt, particularly when a few people on this thread seem to believe London is outside the top 20 in the country. Calling Basel and Antwerp weak zoos is nonsense.
As an aside, I have no idea why everyone wants megafauna so badly. If you want megafauna, go visit somewhere else. It’s that simple. It comes down to whether London is getting enough visitors through the gates, and they are for now, so I can’t understand for the life of me why the same people who complain about homogeneity in zoos want megafauna at London so bad. Just a thought.
It was meant as an example. This fantasy plan still left 20% of the zoo for the paths, keeper areas etc. and was 5 ha. You can add space for whatever, and it will be less than London Zoo 14 ha.
Because London is one of wealthiest cities in the world.
Zoos in small towns can only dream about such a base to look for support and sponsors. Surely, London copes with post-COVID and other problems, but so does rest of the world.
You seem not to understand, that every zoo has strong points and weak points, but comparing average of London and weak points from other zoos does not make London good.
With small animals, the zoo is not exceptional either. Nor it is especially rich in unique animals - for these, in England go to Hamerton.
It is a little illogical to say in one post that London zoo has too little money and that it receives enough visitors.
Here cause and effect are interlinked. If a zoo is mediocre and not really active in public outreach, then it has too little visitor money and little interest of private sponsors or local government.
London Zoo had a time of certain activity in the 2000s-early 2010s when it opened new gorilla, bird and tiger exhibits. It received publicity far beyond a normal zoo could hope - I saw it in the international news. But then the activity fizzled again. I had a feeling the zoo management did minimum possible and stopped.
Considering money. I am by no means expert in how zoos find sponsors, but this is a whole organization. It is often done by a separate organization, a kind of Friends of Zoo, which builds a network of people who know people. Sponsors are usually companies which have a budget for PR and private people who like the zoo. Celebrities are not often sponsors, they want to ride on publicity, not donate money. Every sponsor usually gives relatively small sum. Donations like 20 m from Roche to Basel Zoo are exceptional. Actually, when Basel Zoo received 750k CHF (8m CHF in today money) from a local businessman Johannes Beck in 1901, until today the zoo holds a day of celebrations on 24. June.
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Kalaw
Well-Known Member
That isn’t really what I was saying? I was just using them as an example to back up my point that just because city zoos can reasonably house megafauna doesn’t mean that they should. I use Antwerp as an example as out of the zoos used by others to prove that size and age should not prevent a city zoo from fitting in megafauna, it was the only one that I had visited (asides from Paris, which, much like London, leaves many larger mammals out). I wasn’t using them as evidence that London is a better zoo than Antwerp, which in my opinion is absolutely untrue. I am sure there are other zoos which prove spatial constraints alone shouldn’t stop a zoo from housing megafauna, but once you factor in age, budget and design, you realise it really isn’t that simple. The fantasy scenario you created above is interesting, but it is a very different situation to the one at Regent’s Park.
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In my view, London Zoo is seriously undershooting its potential. I don't believe people know how much potential space is being wasted:
1) The two lawns behind the Giant Turtles and the new Reptile/Amphibian House
2) The Casson Pavilion sitting empty
3) The Mappin Terraces, Aquarium unused
4) The Institute of Virology behind the Mappin Terraces, could this be moved elsewhere?
5) The Old Reptile House soon to be empty (I highly doubt ZSL will house anything here as it's not suitable, it will become a museum/education centre)
6) The lawns next to Butterfly Paradise and War Memorial
7) Land of Lions ethnographic areas + hotel
8) "Activity Den" on the other side of Tiny Giants
9) Penguin Pool of course (maybe move to Tate?)
10) The ZSL main building, Library/Archives, and the Lecture Theatre (maybe plan to move some of these next to the car park?)
11) Woodland Walk next to the canal
12) Across the canal, east of Monkey Valley completely unused. Also there's more space west of Monkey Valley earmarked for education.
So I would really appreciate it if they tried to squeeze out more out of the very limited land available because expansion is 100% impossible. The only viable expansion space is the southeast corner near the Readymoney Drinking Fountain. Maybe you could squeeze out another 2000+ square meters there, enough for one animal exhibit.
I feel ZSL isn't even trying anymore. They take London for granted due to the favourable location, massive and relatively wealthy population and they have no incentive to improve their product. They want to find alternate revenue streams that don't involve more animals. They're also worried that making London Zoo too excellent would reduce visitors to Whipsnade.
As for the zoo-goers with happy memories who don't want Mappin or Casson demolished, the next generation don't have any memories associated with those structures. So, in my view they will have to go eventually.
Of course, finances are stretched but creating an ambitious masterplan MIGHT attract some potential donors. But they haven't bothered.
A fun thing to speculate about would be how one could use some of the wasted spaces I mentioned above to house animals and how ZSL could transform them into exhibit areas. Assuming funds were available, what animals could go there?
1) The two lawns behind the Giant Turtles and the new Reptile/Amphibian House
2) The Casson Pavilion sitting empty
3) The Mappin Terraces, Aquarium unused
4) The Institute of Virology behind the Mappin Terraces, could this be moved elsewhere?
5) The Old Reptile House soon to be empty (I highly doubt ZSL will house anything here as it's not suitable, it will become a museum/education centre)
6) The lawns next to Butterfly Paradise and War Memorial
7) Land of Lions ethnographic areas + hotel
8) "Activity Den" on the other side of Tiny Giants
9) Penguin Pool of course (maybe move to Tate?)
10) The ZSL main building, Library/Archives, and the Lecture Theatre (maybe plan to move some of these next to the car park?)
11) Woodland Walk next to the canal
12) Across the canal, east of Monkey Valley completely unused. Also there's more space west of Monkey Valley earmarked for education.
So I would really appreciate it if they tried to squeeze out more out of the very limited land available because expansion is 100% impossible. The only viable expansion space is the southeast corner near the Readymoney Drinking Fountain. Maybe you could squeeze out another 2000+ square meters there, enough for one animal exhibit.
I feel ZSL isn't even trying anymore. They take London for granted due to the favourable location, massive and relatively wealthy population and they have no incentive to improve their product. They want to find alternate revenue streams that don't involve more animals. They're also worried that making London Zoo too excellent would reduce visitors to Whipsnade.
As for the zoo-goers with happy memories who don't want Mappin or Casson demolished, the next generation don't have any memories associated with those structures. So, in my view they will have to go eventually.
Of course, finances are stretched but creating an ambitious masterplan MIGHT attract some potential donors. But they haven't bothered.
A fun thing to speculate about would be how one could use some of the wasted spaces I mentioned above to house animals and how ZSL could transform them into exhibit areas. Assuming funds were available, what animals could go there?
You say space is being wasted but several of these locations are either not within the perimeter fence of the zoo (therefore not covered by the zoo licence) or are currently in use, for animal housing or other purposes.
Again, London is not a blank canvas, possibly the farthest from it of almost any zoo in the world actually.
Looking at the strength of the finance sector in London and assuming this translates automatically into funding isn’t how it works. Either way, neither you nor I are anywhere near as well placed to know the extent to which ZSL can use the wealth of the city to its advantage as those working there, so in the finances discussion I’d suggest they know better than anyone here and it’s useless taking it further.
Just because it isn’t brimming in cool small mammals (and in fairness it doesn’t slack off in that area either… Potto, a couple of loris and bushbaby species apiece, aye aye, boky boky) doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a great collection. The bird collection is up there with the best in the UK, primates similarly as already ascertained, there’s some nice rarities in the herp and invert scene too. It might not be Hamerton but it’s one of the top ten best collections in the UK for sure.
Putting words into my mouth - I said it isn’t a fountain of money to the extent that it can afford to undergo the substantial costs of actually doing something with the Mappins currently, especially when the return off that redevelopment probably won’t be massive.
Either way it’s all a bit irrelevant. The vast majority here I’m sure have no sway over what the zoo decides to do and have far less knowledge of the current situation, both financial and zoological than those who run the place, with perhaps a select few exceptions. Debating what direction we think the zoo should take is fine up to a point but it starts to lose any semblance of construction when financials come into the equation in my opinion.
Might you be a bit more specific? I know some of these aren't within the perimeter of the zoo but it is still land owned by the zoo? Therefore apply for zoo license expansion?
Also which of the locations I mentioned is used for animal housing? I would like to know please.
This has indoor housing for the Babirusa and Red River Hogs (with what looks like a new indoor enclosure under development), and is currently accessible to the public. Also has a lot of theming that seems to be events-related.
This was the proposed intention when the closure was first announced. Considering how popular museums are in the capital and elsewhere, this would seem to be a sound use of an old building.
The area west of Monkey Valley is an education building and community allotment space where food is grown for the animals. If a zoo wants to retain its license it has to have provision for education, and this seems like a good space for it - a little out the way of the main public areas and gives the overly-urbanised children of London's schools a chance to engage with nature and growing plants.
Agreed about the area to the east where the smaller aviaries used to be, that area could be developed and maybe it will. The recent developments have been of good quality and this bodes well I feel for the future of London. Personally I haven't felt so positive in this regard for quite a while.
What about using the two unused main lawns for walkthrough areas like Patagonian Mara or Wallabies?
That will free up area in front of Mappin and change the theme from Outback to some more popular African antelope?
As for education, the old Aquarium could fulfil that role and if the area west of Monkey Valley is earmarked for rural activity, why not use the Activity Den next to Tiny Giants to exhibit animals? Move the Emu here to free up the Outback area.
Land of Lions ethnographic area could house more relevant animals. For example a Lion Tailed Macaque.
Why can't Woodland Walk be used for animal exhibits? I'd add an Ocelot in this area. People don't go to zoos for native wildlife so devoting so much space to this when there's so little space feels counterintuitive.
Lawn around Butterfly Paradise could house kid-friendly animals, such as Fennec Fox.
There's so much they could do. I don't think any of these things would cost significant additional money of construction. It's just a matter of effort.
No the zoo owns none of the land in Regent's Park