Twycross Zoo Twycross Zoo news 2012 #4

I merely stated that I would have thought none of it if the house were acquired to house staff or researchers, just for that purpose. Given that the CEO eventually took up residence there seems to have been a bit at odds with the above scenario.

I would be the last to suggest to sell off now at below market pricing.


For the rest I agree that most probably no-one would have cared to delve so deep to venture into the financial running, comings and goings of the zoo if the zoo had been a operating and mindblowing success! :)
 
I think that Twycross has it's best chance to move forward in many years
but it is essential that it learns lessons from it's failure of management and I think that those who are saying forget the past and carry on regardless are missing the point. What has been allowed to happen in the last 7 years IS the problem.
 
stulch said:
New Entry in Twycross Zoo's Chimpanzee Blog:-

Twycross Chimps | Twycross Zoo's Chimpanzee Blog!
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With so many Chimps in different enclosures, its difficult to keep track of which ones are where, particularly as they often don't state the house locations involved in the moves.

Here I am presuming 'Ricky' came from the oldest(original) Gorilla House behind the mansion, and 'Mongo' from the Green Mile. Is that right?

Are Louis and Choppers in the original Gorilla House, and if so, are they the only ones in there now?
 
Pertinax said:
With so many Chimps in different enclosures, its difficult to keep track of which ones are where, particularly as they often don't state the house locations involved.

Here I am presuming 'Ricky' came from the oldest(original) Gorilla House behind the mansion, and 'Mongo' from the Green Mile. Is that right?

Are Louis and Choppers in the original Gorilla House, and if so, are they the only ones in there now?
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All your assumptions are correct. :) I don't think Ricky and Louis hit it off at all in the old gorilla house.
 
Thanks. Am I also correct in thinking until he moved, that 'Mongo' was with Coco and Noddy in the Green Mile? In which case they will be reunited when Coco and Noddy are moved to the new accomodation also?
 
mazfc said:
All your assumptions are correct. :) I don't think Ricky and Louis hit it off at all in the old gorilla house.
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Why is it that Twycross struggle to intergrate all their chimps into 1 or 2 or even 3 large groups? I look at places like Monkeyworld and they usually can fit a chimp into one of the various groups, and they often have more issues I would guess than a Twycross chimp. :confused:
 
CambsVet said:
Why is it that Twycross struggle to intergrate all their chimps into 1 or 2 or even 3 large groups? I look at places like Monkeyworld and they usually can fit a chimp into one of the various groups, and they often have more issues I would guess than a Twycross chimp. :confused:
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I think one of the problems at Twycross is the old age of some of the Chimps which are very long established there in the various pairings they have lived in for many years up till now. At Monkeyworld the groups were initially formed mainly from adolescent animals (more adaptable) though with some adults too. I don't know if they have had many problems but one old male was certainly killed there by others in a group it was introduced too.

But normally its quite possible to integrate adults too. Look at what's just happened at Twycross, two adult males(Ricky and Mongo) which haven't(?) been together before and yet have seemingly integrated without any trouble though the staff were obviously expecting some. But certain individuals will never get along, which is presumably why 'Ricky' has moved houses to meet fresh companions.

I think Monkeyworld have always been used to dealing with big Chimp groups whereas although Twycross have had all their Chimps for so long, they have little experience of integrating individuals into different groupings before. But they are finding out now that it can be done with far less fuss than maybe they thought it would be. IMO this should have been done thirty years ago.
 
I think ive completely lost track of which chimp is where now. Have twycorss extablished the subspecies status of any of their chimps yet, or are they all presumed to be hybrid? Im curious as IUCN lists all chimp subspecies, including the central, as endangered. So what is the reaosn for twycross not breeding theirs? nowhere to house expanding groups? unclear subspecie status or all known to be hybridised?
 
They did have a student doing a project to try to get the chimps to do cheek swabs a few years ago when I was chatting to a keeper but I don't know if they succeeded. I guess the current moves will have allowed them to get blood samples from them all.

I think they've probably got too many problems improving their living conditions and getting them into adequate groups to think about breeding them, at least I would hope that until they are all in good housing they would not breed any more.
 
Pertinax said:
I think one of the problems at Twycross is the old age of some of the Chimps which are very long established there in the various pairings they have lived in for many years up till now. At Monkeyworld the groups were initially formed mainly from adolescent animals (more adaptable) though with some adults too. I don't know if they have had many problems but one old male was certainly killed there by others in a group it was introduced too.
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Rodney's death didn't occurr in introductions though, he died as a result of an episode where the young group of chimps who he lived with were maturing and were trying their luck, they didn't actually kill him although he was injured and died of a heart attack later, quite possibly had some of the cardiac disease that captive chimps seem to be at risk of. My theory is that the main cause of his death was that he didn't have 'henchmen' as he would in a normally structured group (and as Butch in the bachelor group has) and therefore had no back-up when the young adolescent males started to want to challenge him.

But normally its quite possible to integrate adults too. Look at what's just happened at Twycross, two adult males(Ricky and Mongo) which haven't(?) been together before and yet have seemingly integrated without any trouble though the staff were obviously expecting some. But certain individuals will never get along, which is presumably why 'Ricky' has moved houses to meet fresh companions.
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Remains to be seen what will happen when females come into the equation.
Certainly Jambo seems to have fitted well into Ricky's group and Ricky was the loser there.

Monkey World have had problems with males in the mixed groups but the bachelor group seems to work well now. I used to think the bachelor group was a sort of consolation prize for when males failed to get into other groups but Ben the chimp born at Monkey World and reared in the nursery absolutely blossomed when he went in there and they seem to to get along pretty well as a group with some fairly difficult cases in there.
 
I think a big factor to be considered in any talk of breeding at Twycross is the fact that most of their current chimps are very elderly unfortunately.
 
OrangePerson said:
Rodney's death didn't occurr in introductions though, he died as a result of an episode where the young group of chimps who he lived with were maturing and were trying their luck, they didn't actually kill him although he was injured and died of a heart attack later, quite possibly had some of the cardiac disease that captive chimps seem to be at risk of. My theory is that the main cause of his death was that he didn't have 'henchmen' as he would in a normally structured group (and as Butch in the bachelor group has) and therefore had no back-up when the young adolescent males started to want to challenge him.


Certainly Jambo seems to have fitted well into Ricky's group and Ricky was the loser there.
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Sorry if I gave a wrong portrayal of that situation with 'Rodney' at Monkeyworld. It does sound like a 'ganging up' situation.:( These Chimp groups have to be very finely balanced to work properly. Ever read 'Chimpanzee Politics' about the Arnhem Zoo Chimps? When they set up their group in the 1970's, they had to remove the two most dominant females for a few months to allow the three (newly introduced) adult males time to establish their dominance in the group, as initially they were quite terrified of the already established female group.

I saw the male 'Pepe' at Dudley Zoo when he was kept as the only male with the newly-arrived large female group from London. He was transformed from a normal dominant male and had regressed into a nervous frightened wreck- I wasn't surprised to hear of his death soon after.

Twycross- can you explaind 'Ricky's group' and the timeline of which animals were in it before and which are in it now? I am still very confused with a lot of their Chimps.
 
FINALLY said:
I think a big factor to be considered in any talk of breeding at Twycross is the fact that most of their current chimps are very elderly unfortunately.
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I think this discussion is mainly about the mixing of the Twycross chimps into more acceptable-sized groupings rather than breeding. I think with them all being mixed race or unknown/untested provenance plus mostly, as you said, being elderly, breeding isn't a priority.

If ever(??) they have a large complex and one single group (do Pigs fly?) then a fresh offspring or two from the younger ones would add to the social dynamic of the group obviously and as the oldest animals slowly die off, a younger generation would need to replace them.
 
Thanks to everyone for answering my question :)

I guess ideally they should move all these elderly chimps into 1 or 2 larger groups and then once the housing situation and basic problems have been sorted get in a new young group which is subspecies specific if they wanted a breeding group. I guess that will not happen for a great many years if ever!
 
sooty mangabey said:
Selling off the family silver is rarely a good idea; doing so at a time of turbulence would certainly be ill-advised. Looking at the situation as an outsider, I would have thought it highly desirable for the zoo to hold property adjacent to its boundary, whether it be used to house a future director, or staff, or whatever.

The Twycross story over the past few years follows a fairly classic pattern for a business that has been developed by a charismatic individual, and has grown up without ever being fully under-pinned. The investment in offices - and the people who work in those offices (such as, possibly, graphic designers) has been criticised above. Such criticism may be fair - but it is almost certain that the zoo was lacking the support structures that any organisation of this size needs. I think one of the reasons why Chester has thrived so much over the past decades is because, following George Mottershead's standing down, Michael Brambell was able to get everything established for others to then come in and develop the zoo in exciting ways. I'm not sure that such development would have been possible had the back-room stuff not been sorted first, though.

I do not seek to claim that Twycross, today, is anything other than a deeply-flawed zoo, nor to suggest that the out-going director does not deserve the opprobrium that has even sent her way. I do not know enough about the inner workings of the zoo over the past years to pass comment.

I do know, though, that in any business people get sacked or made redundant, fairly or unfairly, and that those people will not ever come to love the person who has helped them on their way!

And also that when change comes, even when it is vital - and I would be surprised if anyone were to argue that the zoo as it existed at the end of Molly Badham's time did not need fundamental change - people who lose out because of that change are dissatisfied.

The simple fact is, though, that if the zoo were better - if it had addressed the issues over the ape housing, and it had done the carnivore thing, and it had proper groups of monkeys in decent housing and so on - nobody would care about staff who had been made redundant, or bungalows that had been bought, or graphic designers that had been employed, or zombie themed fun and games.
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As always a well written and thoughtful post from yourself, right I have just dusted my zoo chat tennis racquet:)Selling the family silver?, I always thought this expression referred to selling off valued family treasures which may have passed down from one generation to another, not to something that was only purchased a few years ago and has never even been used for the purpose for which it was originally intended when the trustees at the time approved the purchase of the house across the road from the zoo. In fairness to the previous direction, I appreciate some of the things done at the zoo in the last few years, I like the new pets corner and also the improvements made at the elephant house, I always enjoy a walk around the Mary Brancker walkway, however, for you to suggest that we would not care about the staff or the zoo's finances if there had been a new big cat house or chimp complex, I find that very hard to take in. During my visits to this zoo during the last couple of years, on two occasions, two individual members of the zoo keeping staff have broke down in tears when telling me about how they felt at the time working at this zoo, and I am not been dramatic when I say this, I am simply stating a fact, I cannot obviously comment on any other members views on this as I am only speaking for myself, yes, I do indeed care about the staff at this zoo, new lion house or not, in fact this year I have not visited this zoo at all, the main reason being, knowing myself for who I am, I do not think I would have been capable of keeping my big gob shut, and may have felt the need to give a certain individual a right mouth full!
 
CambsVet said:
I guess ideally they should move all these elderly chimps into 1 or 2 larger groups and then once the housing situation and basic problems have been sorted get in a new young group which is subspecies specific if they wanted a breeding group. I guess that will not happen for a great many years if ever!
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I think your last sentence here sums up the situation pretty well.;)

I also think they'll be happy when they have got to the stage of removing all the Chimps from the row of old cages('Chimp Row' or to us, the 'Green Mile') and into the more suitable(?) housing in the three larger Apehouses whih currently hold Chimpanzees there. But it sounds like they will still be divided into several groupings even after that, though overall it will be an improvement-visually at any rate.

Whether or not they actually then go a stage further with building the large new Chimpanzee complex, as is talked about, remains to be seen. If so, it would presumably be for as many of their existing Chimps as is feasible, rather than any new ones. However, natural attrition from old age of more of the current ones over time could change things.
 
In answer to the chimp questions:

Jambo's current group:

F - Tojo (who was Jambo's partner in the green mile)
M - Flynn he's apparently second in command (used to live in green mile with 2 females (names escape me) but was actually brought up with Becky and Josie) he was the first chimp to move in these chimp moves.
M - jomar (Ricky's original group. Moved out with Ricky but was put back in) strikes me as a chimp who knows which side his bread is buttered.
F - Josie, genet and victoria (Ricky's original females, there was also Becky but she passed away)
F - lottie (Charlotte) who was in the green mile with coco, noddy and mongo. I have a feeling that she was in there with Flynn. She was moved in with just Ricky to keep him company, but moved up to the new enclosure with the rest of them.

Next door: M - Ricky and mongo (he was on the green mile with coco and noddy)

Old gorilla house: currently just m Louis and f chopper. There is talk of moving Benji, tuli and Rosie next door, but they are currently on the green mile.

Also on green mile coco and noddy ( both f) but they will be moving very shortly.

Middle chimp complex:

Kips Group: m Peter and William, f Samantha, holly and Jolly. These have been established a long while now. In the other side males Danny and Tommy. From the behaviour I've observed I really don't think it will be long before they are all together, probably with either a Danny/Kip alliance or Danny fully dominant.

I think the lady from Edinburgh has done really well so far. I truly hope that the chimp complex or some kind of improved housing goes ahead soon.

There are no plans to breed at the moment that I know of as the chimps are a mixed bag apparently. I don't think it would be right to breed them when their housing needs such work anyway.
 
mazfc said:
I think the lady from Edinburgh has done really well so far. I truly hope that the chimp complex or some kind of improved housing goes ahead soon.
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Thanks for taking the time to list all the current groupings and combinations. They evidently still have some way to go yet but progress is progress!

Presumably the lady from Edinburgh has experience from there of integrating groups of adult Chimps together to form the single large Budongo Forest group display and is now applying that skill by overseeing all this at Twycross.

I agree breeding shouldn't be on the cards until they're all properly sorted out but the question remains, will they then really go a stage further with a single large group?
 
mazfc said:
Old gorilla house: currently just m Louis and f chopper. There is talk of moving Benji, tuli and Rosie next door, but they are currently on the green mile.
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On the blog it says they will be upgrading the 'furniture' in this enclosure. As there are only the two chimps in there at present, it does seem the obvious place for Benji, Tuli and Rosie as they have an empty available half of that house(indoors) for them to move into and for introductions to be made.

My guess is those three(B,T & R) will be the last three Chimps to leave the Green Mile.
 
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