That was my name for it. Before they built these new enclosures they should have gone to Howletts and Port Lympne to see their new primate enclosures, and then tried to copy them as far as possible.
The enclosure simply looks as if it were cheaply tossed together, with splintered wood and second-rate beams. The exhibit is definitely large in size, but "immersive" it is not.
What perplexes me is that Paignton have in the past gone to great lengths to say they try to exhibit animals under as NATURAL conditions as possible. For example, the Orangutan outdoor island is very natural, and the Gorilla one similarly so. Then later they build these enclosures for the Monkeys....
What you can't see in the photo is that 3 of the 4 enclosures (Housing 2 Colobus groups, One Dianas, one Sulawesi macaques) each has a very large Plane Tree in the centre, but these are hotwired to stop the monkeys accessing them -as obviously species like Colobus would soon denude all the leaves and ruin the appearance of these long established trees- but its still directly at odds with how the monkeys should be exhibited.
I would have built these enclosures in an entirely different part of the zoo- somewhere they could utilised some less valuable trees into the enclosures which the monkeys could actually access.
The sloping camel Paddocks are so that when the youngsters are born they hit the fence and are zapped into reality..Poor Trevor experienced this as i watched him trying to stand and he kept falling downhill and at one stage i think the electric current was turned of.
Same thing with Clive who is now standing
another reason I would have sited 'Monkey Heights' elsewhere. This area is fairly level and it used to be the old cattle sheds housing the Camels, Zebras etc in the old days. So I would have saved it for those species or their counterparts. Primates can live on sloping areas quite happily and can often be exhibited to better advantage in that situation- preferably in an area with plenty of trees, some of which could be utilised into the enclosures..
I think this was VERY bad planning in the usage of one of the more level parts of the Zoo...
another reason I would have sited 'Monkey Heights' elsewhere. This area is fairly level and it used to be the old cattle sheds housing the Camels, Zebras etc in the old days. So I would have saved it for those species or their counterparts. Primates can live on sloping areas quite happily and can often be exhibited to better advantage in that situation- preferably in an area with plenty of trees, some of which could be utilised into the enclosures..
I think this was VERY bad planning in the usage of one of the more level parts of the Zoo...
Where exactly did you have in mind?
One of the drawbacks of Monkey Heights has just been replicated in the Tiger Viewing Platform - the noise from, mainly, children running on the wooden ramps.
