Catskill Game Farm (Closed) Catskill Game Farm

Ungulate

Ungulate

Well-Known Member
15+ year member
The Catskill Game Farm, formerly of upstate New York (just south of Albany), closed in October 2006. The owners were responsible for several major importations of exotics (most Ankole-Watusi cattle in North America can be traced back to them, I believe), and the collection was large and contained some surprising rarities right up until the end.

There was interest raised on another thread about species held at the Catskill Game Farm; below is the list based on a visit in September 2006.

EQUIDS
Kulan
Poitou donkeys
Grant's zebra
Przewalski's horses
Sheltand ponies
"Somali" and "Nubian" wild asses (hybrid)
Bred-back tarpan
Miniature donkeys
Onager
Grevy's zebra

WILD CATTLE
Wisent
Yak
Texas longhorn
Dwarf zebu
Watusi
Congo buffalo
Water buffalo
Gayal
American bison

CAPRIDS
European mouflon
Barbary sheep
West Caucasian tur
Himalayan tahr
Barbados sheep
Texas Dall's sheep

CERVIDS
Reeves's muntjac
American elk
White American elk
European red deer
Altai wapiti (hybrid)
Dyabowski sika
Japanese sika
European fallow deer
Chital
Hog deer
Barasingha
Pere David's deer
White-tailed deer
Reindeer

ANTELOPE
Red lechwe
Waterbuck
Addax
Sable antelope
Arabian oryx
Scimitar-horned oryx
Common eland
Greater kudu
Nilgai
Blackbuck

OTHER HOOFSTOCK
White rhino
Warthog
Wild boar
Collared peccary
Giraffe
Guanaco
Llama
Alpaca
Bactrian camel
Dromedary

OTHER MAMMALS
Capybara
Mara
African crested porcupine
Black bear (cubs)
Cougar
Lions
Ring-tailed lemur
Vervet monkey
... plus lots of domestic stock, including goats, sheep, calves, pot-bellied pigs, etc.

BIRDS
Ostrich
Emu
Double-wattled cassowary
Rhea
Caribbean flamingo
Several cockatoos and macaws, peafowl

Also a small collection of "standard" reptiles, including American alligators, iguanas, boas/pythons, tortoises ...
 
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Anyone know what happened to the rarer species in that collection? Wisent, Grevy's zebras, wild asses etc...
 
I have seen old pictures of baby elephants at the Game Farm and didn't they also have some elephant act. I believe they had African and Asian correct me if I'm wrong.
 
Ituri said:
Anyone know what happened to the rarer species in that collection? Wisent, Grevy's zebras, wild asses etc...
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Everything was auctioned off. The only one I know the specifics on is a male white rhino (I am assuming the only rhino they had at the time). It was sold to a Texas game ranch, allegedly to be shot to a high bidder for a canned hunt. (I say allegedly because I am not sure this is legal - certainly it could have been sold to a game ranch that does hold canned hunts, but that does not mean every animal on the ranch is hunted).

Anyway, the owner of Ecko clothing line, whose company logo is a rhino, found out and saved the rhino by buying it from the game ranch - apparently at a higher price than what they paid. He placed it with Out Of Africa in my state of Arizona. (Rhino now lives in a large habitat of pre-existing thorn bush that is refreshingly different from the dusty paddocks of most zoos or the golf course grasslands of most large wildlife parks).
 
Arizona Docent said:
Everything was auctioned off. The only one I know the specifics on is a male white rhino (I am assuming the only rhino they had at the time). It was sold to a Texas game ranch, allegedly to be shot to a high bidder for a canned hunt. (I say allegedly because I am not sure this is legal - certainly it could have been sold to a game ranch that does hold canned hunts, but that does not mean every animal on the ranch is hunted).

Anyway, the owner of Ecko clothing line, whose company logo is a rhino, found out and saved the rhino by buying it from the game ranch - apparently at a higher price than what they paid. He placed it with Out Of Africa in my state of Arizona. (Rhino now lives in a large habitat of pre-existing thorn bush that is refreshingly different from the dusty paddocks of most zoos or the golf course grasslands of most large wildlife parks).
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Not every was auctioned off the that fum the farm kept a large collection of exotic and domestic animals within the family for their personal pleasure. They have a large compound away from the farm with barns, pens, etc. Some animals kept the Giraffes and Wild Boar.
 
Last summer I went to a small place in Gloversville, NY called Adirondack Animal Land. They have a hayride/safari ride through fields with mainly camels, but along the way the narrator says something like "over here we have the supposedly extinct Tarpan,but we have them". In a fenced in area set off from the trail were several smaller gray horses. They don't advertise them on their website(which their animal list is pretty inaccurate anyway). I wonder if these possibly came from Catskill?? I read something that these newer version of Tarpan are called "Heck Horses".
 
Phantom Gaur said:
Last summer I went to a small place in Gloversville, NY called Adirondack Animal Land. They have a hayride/safari ride through fields with mainly camels, but along the way the narrator says something like "over here we have the supposedly extinct Tarpan,but we have them". In a fenced in area set off from the trail were several smaller gray horses. They don't advertise them on their website(which their animal list is pretty inaccurate anyway). I wonder if these possibly came from Catskill?? I read something that these newer version of Tarpan are called "Heck Horses".
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Adirondack Animal Land did buy some of Catskill Game Farm animals but dont know which animals I remember they had story in the local newspaper about it but I did not the story online any more.

Was just at Adirondack Animal Land the end May was my nephew's first trip to zoo.Wish I take photos of the animals but was thinking my nephew at the time got many of photos him none of just the animals. Likely going back in the fall.
 
Screvier, or any other NY members, did you ever go to Ashville Game Farm in Greenwich,NY? Unfortunately, I believe he had to close after last years season.
 
I went the last year he was open. The owner was a very nice man who loved his animals, the set up was just begging for trouble though. You were able to reach basically into the cages with bears,baboons,macaques.
 
okapikpr said:
They also housed a male Okapi, Nejoma, from 1965 to 1975.
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Was that the parks only okapi ?
and also was Catskill Game Farm AZA accredited, reason I ask is because a Non-AZA zoo cannot have okapis because the Okapi program in the US is severely restricted within AZA zoos and wildlife parks
 
That was Catskill's only Okapi. I don't recall if they were ever AZA accredited. However, they exhibited Okapi before the AZA started accrediting zoos or established the SSP breeding programs. Also, Okapi aren't quite as restricted as you think they are.
 
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