Twycross Zoo Molly's Zoo
- Thread starter JamesB
- Start date
So how come no other zoos dressed-up chimps or handraised babies unnecessarily and humanised other apes so they wouldn't breed? Have you seen where the remaining old 'Tea Party' chimps still live at Twycross?
no i havent seen where they live but i know that london zoo did similar things with thier chimps, can we not start a brawl over this
I think it's a little harsh to judge what was done more than 40 years ago by today's standards. Miss Badham and Miss Evans were petshop keepers whose hobby expanded into a zoo. It couldn't happen today and it should never happen again.
They treated their animals in the way that seemed right to them, as did John Aspinall, Leonard Williams, Len Hill and many other 'eccentric' animal keepers. And like those other aspiring zookeepers, we can now see (with hindsight) that they each got some things right and some things wrong. Those Brooke Bond adverts paid for their zoo (and I suspect that many of the other zoos in the country would have done the same for the money).
We can't change the past. Twycross Zoo must be judged now on what it is today and how the management and staff are working for its future. It aspires to become the World Primate Centre - but there is a lot to do before that title holds true (in my opinion).
Alan
They treated their animals in the way that seemed right to them, as did John Aspinall, Leonard Williams, Len Hill and many other 'eccentric' animal keepers. And like those other aspiring zookeepers, we can now see (with hindsight) that they each got some things right and some things wrong. Those Brooke Bond adverts paid for their zoo (and I suspect that many of the other zoos in the country would have done the same for the money).
We can't change the past. Twycross Zoo must be judged now on what it is today and how the management and staff are working for its future. It aspires to become the World Primate Centre - but there is a lot to do before that title holds true (in my opinion).
Alan
London Zoo held Chimpanzee tea parties(during an earlier era) but that's not quite the same as having them perform for T.V. advertising. But as Gentle Lemur points out, it was all a long time ago now and it was the revenue from that advertising which allowed Twycross to expand as a zoo. However, and despite the very extensive primate collection nowadays, I do think it still has quite a long way to go, both in enclosure design and in some areas of animal management, before it can claim to be a 'top notch' establishment.
I'm only pointing this out as there is food for thought here, so to speak.
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I agree....
And what exactly are you doing for the conservation of endangered species or improving animal welfare? i very much doubt it is on the same scale as what Molly Badham acheived.
taun
Well-Known Member
Paying to get into many of these collections! We all have to remember that attitudes towards how animals should be kept have changed quite rapidly.
I quite agree that we should of know better back then but then that was what people wanted to see!
Plus Tywcross with its many wonderfull species is NOT a great zoo! I hope that the change in management means that a new way forward can be achieved with better consideration to the enclosure design for its animals.
I'd have to ask you exactly what these achievements conservation-wise or 'improving animal welfare' are? Disregarding the TV chimp era I haven't seen a lot of evidence since of mainstream conservation work at Twycross- more a lax attitude when it comes to breeding animals or keeping them in top quality enclosures.
She did 'rescue' some individual animals from bad surroundings and give them a better life- but then sent at least one orangutan to a japanese zoo and probably a worse life. the good work is also rather outweighed by the various endangered species at Twycross(in particular Gorillas & Elephants) which haven't been allowed to breed at their full potential.
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what paying to get into those collections who dont actually do anything to save the species in danger? visiting howletts who say they will release theyre captive bred barbary liosn when they have no chance of doing that! no chance mate! and good come back wesley
So how is Twycross different in that respect?
'Molly's Zoo' may be an entertaining book to read but you shouldn't take everything you read at face value. It by no means tells the whole story and obviously she didn't see anything wrong with her particular approach to zoo -keeping and a style of management which still seems present to a large extent several years after her retirement.
The continuing lack of a bull elephant is a bad omission and has aroused a lot of critisism on this forum. I also think they should have one though I can however see the problems they face with the cost of constructing the proper accomodation.
No such problems exist in the case of Gorillas; a new male should have been brought in a.s.a.p. after Sekondi's death. Apart from his females probably being stressed & miserable without a male, 'Asante' remains unbred at 23 years old despite being the only offspring of wildcaught Eva(now dead) and her genes will be lost to the captive population if this remains unresolved. The arrival of SamSam & Yinka from Edinburgh (originally in transit to Spain) probably killed 'Mamfe' from the stress of suddenly living alongside a strange silverback while the way the older gorillas in particular are displayed seems to me to remove all their dignity. I could go on....
There seems to be a lot of bad mouthing of Molly Badham on here. The woman did what she believed to be right and without her Twycross zoo would never have exist. The way she went about it may have been wrong and it may be right to say the zoo was probably kept behind the times by her. At the end of the day whose to say some of the more revolutionary zoos around today may be classed as being behind the times in a few years.
Its easy to sit here and say she shouldn't have done this and she shouldn't have done that but we didn't run the place. The chimp tea parties may nowadays be seen as cruel but in those days little was known about animal welfare. The money provided by these chimps most likely kept Twycross going so that it could grow and eventually pay the bills through visitors visiting the zoo
Its easy to sit here and say she shouldn't have done this and she shouldn't have done that but we didn't run the place. The chimp tea parties may nowadays be seen as cruel but in those days little was known about animal welfare. The money provided by these chimps most likely kept Twycross going so that it could grow and eventually pay the bills through visitors visiting the zoo