A very good and intersting set of pictures. The enclosures seem to be spacious and fine all over. Possibly with one exception: are the giraffes confined to the enclosures that we see in these pictures?
Nevertheless, although I am never keen on the combination of a zoo and amusement park, I am still OK with most of what I see here. Thanks for uploading the pictures!
What is the story behind the name "Flamingo Land"? It used to be "just that" and was eventually expanded?
A very good and intersting set of pictures. The enclosures seem to be spacious and fine all over. Possibly with one exception: are the giraffes confined to the enclosures that we see in these picture]
No the giraffe have full access to the paddock,they are next to the zebra hardstand i think, the paddock just used to have the three giraffe to begin with untill they added some zebra and ostrich from the other african plains which has zebra,ostrich and scimatar horned oryx.
Flamingoland during its heyday in the 1960s held an unbelievable array of species including all the great apes, many unusual cetacean and pinniped species, elephants, cats etc, but tellingly as imports became more difficult and public opinion expected captive-bred animals, the collection drifted to the more 'hardy' species often seen in the rougher-looking wildlife park collections by the mid-eighties.
When I first saw the park in the early 90s, the zoo was very run down, I remember grants zebra, American Bison, Wapiti, Red Deer, Californian Sealions (the last 3 dolphins had just left), lion, tiger, leopard, lynx, puma, ankole cattle, bactrian camel, common duck and goose species, lar gibbons, capuchins, various elderly stumptailed, 'toque', rhesus and pig-tailed macaques, sooty mangabeys, caracals, wolves, a single asian elephant (Jangoli, now at chester, has since bred, the other cow had died), a very dysfunctional and disparate group of 6 ageing chimps, 2 polar bears with cubs, 1 brown bear, fallow and sika deer, guanacos, collared peccary, rheas, emu, sarus cranes, night herons, sacred ibis, white stork, condors, turkey vultures, caracaras, owls, parakeets, finches, amazon parrots and a few macaws, a single giant tortoise, a few snakes, caiman and american alligators, a small tropical fish collection and domestic stock, as well as the large flock of chilean and caribbean flamingoes from which the park gets its name. Flamingoes are actually fairly hardy and very long-lived as long as their enclosures are fox-proofed.
