The ocelot-cage at berlin zoo. Actually its just indoors for 1,1 cause outside lives an old circus-puma. When he dies they'll geht the outdoors.
No the fence is not round, I just used a fish-eye-lense ;)
Most time's I've seen them they've been sleeping lol. Didn't realise they were normally active. Looking back to Berlin, This probably is quite a bit too small. I think the cage the puma was in had quite a low roof too which wouldn't benefit the ocelots.
Well. According to Wiki they have a typical home range of around 18 square kilometres, and are strictly territorial so patrol their patch constantly. That alone suggests a high level of activity. They're also highly arboreal.
It's just possible that they're sleeping because there's bugger-all else to do. .
Which is why they need to be intensely enriched. These ocelots ought to be in a large outdoor enclosure, at least 50 strides from end to end, with plenty of climbing opportunities, toys, frequent small feeds and rotation with other ocelots to encourage natural territorial responses.
I'm sorry but they don't NEED to be rotated with other animals, if so then that would be the case with all territorial animals. That would help but I can't think of any places that do that.
I'm sorry but they don't NEED to be rotated with other animals, if so then that would be the case with all territorial animals. That would help but I can't think of any places that do that.
Operative word "ought". It's not a basic requirement, but it's something that I think zoos should strive to do with highly territorial species if they can.
An ocelot prowling around a large, planted enclosure scent-marking over its rival and actively looking for the invader is going to be healthier both physically and mentally than one that sleeps 20 hours a day because there's nothing else to do. Not to mention be a significantly better display animal.
There's much that can be done to make small cats charismatic zoo animals. For instance, I imagine noone who has ever had the good fortune of seeing a serval or caracal snatch a bird out of flight would forget it. You can't do it with live prey in zoos (animal rights activists have ensured that the rights of mice, rabbits and birds not to die as they might in the wild come before the rights of servals and ocelots to engage in natural behaviours). You have to rely on the old vagrant animal ending up in the enclosure.
But here's an idea that could be fiddled with to see if it can work: why not set up a low trajectory mortar that can fire dead rodents or something across a serval enclosure? It could be calibrated so that if the serval has to be able to leap and grab the prey item in flight or it will land out of reach.
There's much that can be done to make small cats charismatic zoo animals. For instance, I imagine noone who has ever had the good fortune of seeing a serval or caracal snatch a bird out of flight would forget it. You can't do it with live prey in zoos (animal rights activists have ensured that the rights of mice, rabbits and birds not to die as they might in the wild come before the rights of servals and ocelots to engage in natural behaviours). You have to rely on the old vagrant animal ending up in the enclosure.
I don't know if it has been tried with wild cats or if it would work for that matter but I know domestic cats love lasers. Has this ever been tried with bigger cats?
This house is rebuild part-by-part within next years. So ocelots and other small carnivores are a sort of temporary exhibits. Large carnivores are allowed to die out of old age (like the ex-circus puma).
Anyway, I would welcome they renovate faster, because lots of animals live in substandard exhibits for years...
Compared to most indoor ocelot enclosures this isn't that bad, size wise. And the outside is probably about the same size as this? Too small for a puma, maybe a bit small for ocelot but it's not terrible.
CGSwans;206585
There's much that can be done to make small cats charismatic zoo animals. For instance said:
well they cannot stop it naturally, i was at chester zoo and i saw a young cheetah nearly catch a low flying pigeon (in mid flight) and whilst at newquay zoo, i saw a cockrel attacked by a visayan warty pig
the cockrel found its way into the enclosure ans bye bye cockrel, thanks to me (lol) they saved the other one
There's much that can be done to make small cats charismatic zoo animals. For instance, I imagine noone who has ever had the good fortune of seeing a serval or caracal snatch a bird out of flight would forget it. You can't do it with live prey in zoos (animal rights activists have ensured that the rights of mice, rabbits and birds not to die as they might in the wild come before the rights of servals and ocelots to engage in natural behaviours). You have to rely on the old vagrant animal ending up in the enclosure.
well they cannot stop animals natural instincts, i was at chester zoo and i saw a young cheetah nearly catch a low flying pigeon (in mid flight) and whilst at newquay zoo, i saw a cockrel attacked by a visayan warty pig
the cockrel found its way into the enclosure ans bye bye cockrel, thanks to me (lol) they saved the other one
