Smithsonian National Zoo How should the Smithsonian National Zoo re-purpose their panda exhibit?

NAIB Volunteer said:
The Zoo spent $50 million on Asia Trail and it's the most popular section of the Zoo. They'd never level it for Africa after only 20 years. My bet it remains empty for quite some time.
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Yeah people can speculate all they want but until zoo leadership believes with 100% certainty that pandas ain't returning there's in my opinion only two scenarios that are gonna happen, the exhibits just sit empty or another species is brought in to temporally fill them that requires either no changes or a very minor amount of changes to the current exhibit.
 
Brayden Delashmutt said:
While I don’t think this will happen, if we can be 100% sure that the exhibit won’t be needed for pandas in the future (which at this point we can’t) the area could be turned into a decent complex for giraffes, rhinos, and some other large mammals the zoo is missing. While the big cat area isn’t currently aesthetically pleasing, I don’t the tigers are in need of being moved
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Yeah that ain't happening. Adjacent to Asia Trail, on a hill, way too much money put into the landscaping/exhibit design. My guess is they'll board up the yards and have posters highlighting the zoo's history with pandas, and repurpose the indoor exhibits for Asian birds or more red pandas from SCBI. Either that or repurposing the yards for more sloth bears (lord knows the species needs more holders), or even some rescued Asian black bears from a roadside zoo. (HONESTLY, best way forward as that'd generate good PR and give the bears from Natural Bridge Zoo a spectacular new home to live out their years while the zoo works behind the scenes to get pandas back). Only way the zoo's getting giraffes back is when they get their parking situation sorted out.
 
StoppableSan said:
Yeah that ain't happening. Adjacent to Asia Trail, on a hill, way too much money put into the landscaping/exhibit design. My guess is they'll board up the yards and have posters highlighting the zoo's history with pandas, and repurpose the indoor exhibits for Asian birds or more red pandas from SCBI. Either that or repurposing the yards for more sloth bears (lord knows the species needs more holders), or even some rescued Asian black bears from a roadside zoo. (HONESTLY, best way forward as that'd generate good PR and give the bears from Natural Bridge Zoo a spectacular new home to live out their years while the zoo works behind the scenes to get pandas back). Only way the zoo's getting giraffes back is when they get their parking situation sorted out.
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Natural Bridge no longer has any bears. Even if they did, they wouldn't be giving them up, especially in a way that would cause a lot of bad press for themselves.
 
TinoPup said:
Natural Bridge no longer has any bears. Even if they did, they wouldn't be giving them up, especially in a way that would cause a lot of bad press for themselves.
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Could have sworn they had four at one point... were they transferred out or did they die of old age?
 
TinoPup said:
Natural Bridge no longer has any bears. Even if they did, they wouldn't be giving them up, especially in a way that would cause a lot of bad press for themselves.
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That's interesting. They're still featured on their species list on their website. I know you shared pictures of their sorry exhibit a year or two ago. Do you know if they moved elsewhere or just passed away recently?
 
StoppableSan said:
Could have sworn they had four at one point... were they transferred out or did they die of old age?
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TheGytrash said:
That's interesting. They're still featured on their species list on their website. I know you shared pictures of their sorry exhibit a year or two ago. Do you know if they moved elsewhere or just passed away recently?
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They've had several over the years; in 2003 two got out and broke into someone's home, one was killed in the home and the other by a hunter a few days later. I don't know if those two are part of the 4 you're mentioning.

They had two at the beginning of 2021, and I saw just one a few months later on my visit. I would assume they passed away, they had to have been in at least their late 20s. There isn't really anywhere for them to have been sent, especially at that age anyway.

Roadside zoos are especially horrible at updating their websites.
 
Like @NAIB Volunteer said, If the zoo is confident on getting another pair, I doubt anything will happen. I think something small like tufted deer might be a good animal to hold them over.

I like the idea of tigers mentioned before. I feel like exhibit, being hilly, would be great for takins. Renovating the indoor areas would be tricky though, but I feel that the takins would be perfect for the habitat
 
TheGytrash said:
The only thing with using it for giraffes or rhinos or whatever is that it's in the heart of the zoo's Asian exhibit, so it might feel weird and incongruous to have African animals there. The upper-level panda viewing overlooks the Asian elephant yards and it's adjacent to the Asia Trail exhibit, specifically next to the red pandas.

Also, despite the panda yards being large, they're totally wrong for giraffes unless you really change the landscaping. They're rocky, hilly, and full of trees.

Looking at the Himalaya Highlands exhibit at the Bronx Zoo, I wonder if snow leopards would pair well with red pandas? Maybe have birds like cranes and pheasants in the third panda yard? Still, the exhibit is designed for multi-level viewing and accommodating huge numbers of viewers, and something like snow leopards likely wouldn't draw that kind of a crowd.
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Okay, fair, I get it won’t happen, but for the thought COULD they hypothetically use Indian rhinos?
 
This article in the Smithsonian Magazine seems very hopeful of getting more, in spite of politics.
The pandas’ impending departure arrives at a time of heightened tensions between the U.S. and China. But NZCBI officials don’t think these tensions will hinder panda conservation efforts, including potential negotiations to bring pandas back to Washington in the near future.

“The people who are having the conversations, they’re the animal people, they’re the wildlife people, they’re the conservation people,” Smith tells Foreign Policy’s Rishi Iyengar.

She adds, “None of us are qualified to talk about the bigger geopolitical situation, but I can say all of our conversations are very strong; they’re very positive. The work we do is so collaborative, it’s really focusing on that and hoping for the best.”
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Brayden Delashmutt said:
Oh absolutely. I was just asking whether or not it was physically possible, lol
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That site actually was rhinos at one point, before the zoo obtained its first pandas in the 1970s, when it was the delicate hoofstock section. So it would be possible to change it back - but it would probably involve bulldozing the entire thing into dust and starting from scratch, so not something likely to happen.
 
[Glad to hear that.
Aardwolf said:
That site actually was rhinos at one point, before the zoo obtained its first pandas in the 1970s, when it was the delicate hoofstock section. So it would be possible to change it back - but it would probably involve bulldozing the entire thing into dust and starting from scratch, so not something likely to happen.
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Interesting, and yeah, if the zoo hopes to get pandas back I doubt they’ll do that. Would it be possible for the zoo to combine them and make a yard for some sort of other hoofstock species, say, takins?
 
Brayden Delashmutt said:
Interesting, and yeah, if the zoo hopes to get pandas back I doubt they’ll do that. Would it be possible for the zoo to combine them and make a yard for some sort of other hoofstock species, say, takins?
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Not to sounds like "that guy", but anything is possible with money should they choose to spend it on that kind of project. The thing is that it may be possible to radically or even partially change the enclosure, it is unlikely if they are going to get back "into" pandas as some point in the next (x) amount of years. Most likely is to use it for additional red panda, sloth bears, or something that would require pretty much no changes other than cosmetic.

All that said, the yards are actually a pretty decent size already, putting takin or something would not necessarily require combining the yards.
 
SwampDonkey said:
Not to sounds like "that guy", but anything is possible with money should they choose to spend it on that kind of project. The thing is that it may be possible to radically or even partially change the enclosure, it is unlikely if they are going to get back "into" pandas as some point in the next (x) amount of years. Most likely is to use it for additional red panda, sloth bears, or something that would require pretty much no changes other than cosmetic.

All that said, the yards are actually a pretty decent size already, putting takin or something would not necessarily require combining the yards.
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Interesting. I’d love to see a few Asian hoofstock species - wasn’t the zoo rumored to be getting Mishmi Takin back in the day?
 
SwampDonkey said:
Not to sounds like "that guy", but anything is possible with money should they choose to spend it on that kind of project. The thing is that it may be possible to radically or even partially change the enclosure, it is unlikely if they are going to get back "into" pandas as some point in the next (x) amount of years. Most likely is to use it for additional red panda, sloth bears, or something that would require pretty much no changes other than cosmetic.
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I would hope red pandas is not the route they end up taking. The zoo already has an excellent red panda exhibit, and it'd be an immense waste of space to dedicate three, very large outdoor yards into an exhibit for one of the most common zoo species. Furthermore, in their current form those exhibits would require the red pandas to locomote on the ground long distances between the trees and climbing structures, which isn't really the ideal exhibit design for them. I also question if anyone would be able to see a red panda in there with how large it is, but that's beside the point.

Sloth bears could be a better choice, although that population is now at the point where space available is higher than breeding that's occurring. However, with the zoo starting to breed sloth bears in the near future, more space available to them certainly can't hurt.

As much as I hope the zoo never gets pandas again, it does seem like that is still the zoo's goal unfortunately. I do agree that they likely won't want to do major renovations to a complex they may still use in the future, but I do think it would be better to temporarily fill the space with something new to the collection (e.g. tufted deer, cranes, etc.) instead of more space to animals that don't need it.
 
Neil chace said:
I would hope red pandas is not the route they end up taking. The zoo already has an excellent red panda exhibit, and it'd be an immense waste of space to dedicate three, very large outdoor yards into an exhibit for one of the most common zoo species. Furthermore, in their current form those exhibits would require the red pandas to locomote on the ground long distances between the trees and climbing structures, which isn't really the ideal exhibit design for them. I also question if anyone would be able to see a red panda in there with how large it is, but that's beside the point.

Sloth bears could be a better choice, although that population is now at the point where space available is higher than breeding that's occurring. However, with the zoo starting to breed sloth bears in the near future, more space available to them certainly can't hurt.

As much as I hope the zoo never gets pandas again, it does seem like that is still the zoo's goal unfortunately. I do agree that they likely won't want to do major renovations to a complex they may still use in the future, but I do think it would be better to temporarily fill the space with something new to the collection (e.g. tufted deer, cranes, etc.) instead of more space to animals that don't need it.
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To be clear, I don't think they are going to do anything with the area, I think they have the goal of getting more panda sooner than later.

Most likely they will board up the area from viewing and maybe use the dayrooms for birds.
 
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