Just because the building is required to be preserved it does not necessarily follow that the zoo must keep putting animals in these abysmal hellholes. The Tierpark is a really conflicted place--wonderful big paddocks for hoofed stock, some enormous aviaries, but many relics of zookeeping of the past like the Brehm building.
"Hellholes" might be a bit too melodramatic and exagerrated; they are actually very similiar to the 'modern' indoor quarters of many zoos worldwide...
Preservation orders are quite limiting and the money is, as in most zoos, rather tight-even if Knut brought in some cash...And like all zoos with old exhibits and a rather stubborn dircetor, changes are gonna come (or rather, have already occured)-but not overnight. Go to Berlin by yourself, take a close look, and then judge.
@Sun Wukong: good point about the indoor quarters at major zoos, as even the most beautiful, modern, naturalistic, award-winning habitats often have typical day rooms that are no better than the worst zoos in the world. Sad but true, and the only glimmer for many animals is to have the good fortune to be sent to a zoo in a warm climate. That way they aren't confined to their indoor quarters for days or sometimes weeks on end.
the only glimmer for many animals is to have the good fortune to be sent to a zoo in a warm climate. That way they aren't confined to their indoor quarters for days or sometimes weeks on end.
Or, according to the nature of the animal in question, a zoo in a cold climate... Yet even then one can not rule out indoor husbandry-for example, at night...
