Oct. 2020 - Primate World - Future Bonobo/Former Chimpanzee Exhibit

Looks a bit small and unenriching for bonobos... do you reckon they'll add more climbing structures and more foliage?

I agree, It doesn't look that natural or enlightening for the bonobos.

And that fake termite mound is atrocious...

I'm reading the book Lessons from the Zoo (J.D. Porter - 2020) and Porter discusses the building of this exhibit in the late 1980s. He even acknowledges that "the new chimpanzee area was not especially large" but that one of the chimps often perched on the fake termite mound. More than 30 years have gone by and this exhibit is clearly not adequate in size or variety for great apes. I think that it could perhaps be a sufficient enclosure for baboons or even patas monkeys.

@snowleopard Perhaps. But They definitely need to upgrade this, and its not like this zoo is some rinky dink roadside attraction. I bet they would have the budget to either upgrade this habitat or just bulldoze it altogether.

I wonder where they are getting the bonobos from since the AZA doesn't have an SSP/Studbook for bonobos anymore.

@redpanda756 Other zoos still have Bonobos regardless of whether there is a studybook or not.

The enclosure will eventually be netted over to provide more vertical space. From what a colleague told me this will only be temporary holding. The zoo has plans to eventually move towards a more zoogeographic theme ultimately phasing out Primate World as an area

@redpanda756 The AZA doesn't have a studbook for bonobos anymore?

@redpanda756 I'm also curious where you got the impression that there is no longer an SSP/studbook for Bonobo - it still shows up in the AZA Animal Program Database: Animal Program Database

Also: the zoo announced that this exhibit will not in fact be for bonobos, nor will the chimps return. It is currently unclear what will go here instead.