The tapir houses in Beijing Zoo were originally built for hippos and rhinos in the 1950s. After the pachyderms relocated to the current rhino-and-hippo house in 1994, the old rhino house was refurbished to hold Baird's and Brazilian tapirs in 1998, while the Malayan tapirs moved into the old hippo house in 2011. As their lone Brazilian tapir died last year, the zoo now has one house for each tapir species, and the Baird's also occupies the former enclosure of Nim the Indian rhinoceros in the rhino-and-hippo house, who passed away in late 2020.
