A Few Unrelated Updates.....

Pertinax said:
At Twycross they tend to keep different species next to each other e.g. Pileated, Lar, Pileated, White Cheeked. So pairs of the same species aren't adjacent. But all are relatively close together in 'run' style enlosures. Some species there breed well, others not.
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I know we looked at the breeding records of Twycross primates on another thread, and I cannot recall what the success rates were, but I would be surprised if Twycross has a good record of breeding and parent-rearing gibbon species in this style of housing.
 
Pertinax said:
Can anyone supply an update on the Melbourne Gorillas? Rigo has been in the group many months now and I don't think he is mating the females. Still correct? If so are they going to 1. try AI ( using which male?) or 2. swap the Silverbacks over again or 3. leave things as they are?
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I think Melbourne Zoo are still hoping for Rigo to breed with the females. Embryos from six different female gorillas will be imported in 2011, but i think they will be implanted in Taronga's gorillas, not Melbourne's.

:)
 
LOU said:
I think Melbourne Zoo are still hoping for Rigo to breed with the females. Embryos from six different female gorillas will be imported in 2011, but i think they will be implanted in Taronga's gorillas, not Melbourne's.
:)
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that is interesting news about the embryo transplants. Maybe they will share them out and use one or two of Melbourne's females if there has been no success meantime. I think Melbourne hoping Rigo will still breed may be very unrealistic- if he hasn't been mating any females so far then he never will, if he has(and is still fertile) there should have been pregnancies by now.:(
 
LOU said:
I think Melbourne Zoo are still hoping for Rigo to breed with the females. Embryos from six different female gorillas will be imported in 2011, but i think they will be implanted in Taronga's gorillas, not Melbourne's.
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For a young bloke, not even old enough to be Employed you sure know alot! Whats your secret? LOL!
 
tetrapod said:
I would be surprised if Twycross has a good record of breeding and parent-rearing gibbon species in this style of housing.
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Actually I don't think they have particularly good records with many(if any) species of the Gibbons and personally I'm not in favour of this sort of housing- too many Gibbons all close together- even if the same species pairs are slightly seperated. I think it may be the reason some of their other Monkey species have such poor results too.
 
Pertinax said:
Actually I don't think they have particularly good records with many(if any) species of the Gibbons and personally I'm not in favour of this sort of housing- too many Gibbons all close together- even if the same species pairs are slightly seperated. I think it may be the reason some of their other Monkey species have such poor results too.
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I think you probably have a point - in particular the indoor viewing windows in the Twycross houses are directly opposite another set only a couple of yards away, which can't be ideal.
 
That's okay- I couldn't understand as in the Zoochat age group survey I was the second oldest Zoochatter at the time.:D
 
Yes, Pertinax, you, Steve Robinson, Rookeyper and myself are the oldest (and therefore automatically the wisest :p) members of ZooChat.;)

You make an interesting point; the old animal-keeping approach where a row of monkeys kept cheek-by-jowel would inhibit breeding can possibly be applied equally to a row of carnivores (definitely in the case of small cats) and probably many other animals too.

I remember many years ago when Bullen's Animal World on the outskirts of Sydney had a row of very small cages (each about the size of a domestic bathroom or possibly even smaller) each containing a pair or trio of baboons. Without being able to come to grips with each other, there was nevertheless continual warfare (there's no other word for it) going on; terrific unrelieved tension; neurotic mating activity and despite that not many young successfully raised; (there were a few- baboons are pretty tough.) Many of the public were quite entertained by it, but anyone with any real understanding of the situation found it quite distasteful.

Interestingly, the same park had a large number of leopards in reasonably small cages side by side and they bred like mice!
 
wish there still where leopards :(

by the way - i think i'm the wisest. but certainly not the youngest or oldest. ;)
 
Ara said:
Yes, Pertinax, you, Steve Robinson, Rookeyper and myself are the oldest (and therefore automatically the wisest :p) members of ZooChat.;)

You make an interesting point; the old animal-keeping approach where a row of monkeys kept cheek-by-jowel would inhibit breeding can possibly be applied equally to a row of carnivores (definitely in the case of small cats) and probably many other animals too.

...but anyone with any real understanding of the situation found it quite distasteful.
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The 'old fogies' club? ;) Wisest?- but of course!!!

I well remember the old Monkey House at London Zoo (before the Sobell Pavilions). It was basically a long corridor of similar cages full of different monkey species- everything in size and variety from Drills and Mandrills to Talapoins. All the species could see their neighbours and each other through the dividing mesh. There was lots of displaying/aggression - one or other monkey would display which resulted in a 'chain reaction' of crashing/banging displaying monkeys sweeping through the house- followed by a sudden silence. This happened many times everyday. Visitors enjoyed all the sudden activity and the din, but not surprisingly with such high stress levels there was virtually no successful breeding at all which was a great shame as several unusual species were kept.

I think similar stress levels may be one of the reasons why a zoo like Twycross have not been successful with breeding many of their Monkey species- particularly the large collection of Guenons. Being shy, nervous monkeys, keeping them in close conjunction with other noisy species like Gibbons or Howlers (and very close to visitors too) is hardly likely to encourage successful breeding.

I can also see this ' too close neighours' concept being applicable to other nervous species too- such as the Small Cats you mention.
 
The Aspinall parks have a very impressive record with Silvery gibbons and have a lot of breeding pairs with offspring at Howletts and a further group at Port Lympne - well over 20 animals in total . One of their family groups is also at Belfast and more have been sent to other collections . They have quite a few founders imported from Java , several more animals being received a couple of years ago . At Howletts each large gibbon enclosure is some distance from the next , no doubt in hearing distance when they call but probably not visible - in this respect it is probably quite a natural set-up . I would have thought that in the future they would be able to supply animals to Australian collections if they desired more of the species .

As another zoochat veteran , like Pertinax , I also remember the old Monkey House at London Zoo , particularly Guy the Gorilla in his cell . I do not remember the 'monkey pandemonium' though . However something similar can be experienced at Twycross when one of the groups of gibbons starts calling , then setting off all the rest - it is extremely noisy ! Some of the pairs of gibbons housed in the row at Twycross do manage to breed successfully - I can think of Pileated and Agiles at present - though they also have hand-reared a lot . There used to be quite a few young Siamang but I think most of these are now prevented from breeding . The highlight for me used to be the single Kloss's gibbon , unfortunatle now no longer with us .
 
Bele said:
However something similar can be experienced at Twycross when one of the groups of gibbons starts calling , then setting off all the rest - it is extremely noisy !
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As I said above, I think all those different Monkeys housed so close together in the 'blocks' of cages at Twycross may be the root cause for poor breeding in some of the shyer species, particularly the Guenons.

Sorry to have digressed from the subject of this thread -Australian updates- one thing leads to another...
 
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Bele said:
As another zoochat veteran , like Pertinax , I also remember the old Monkey House at London Zoo , particularly Guy the Gorilla in his cell .
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I too have many memories of the old Monkey House (built 1927) at London Zoo, which I first visited as a small child in the late 1950s. I can also recall all the noise and excitement when the animals started displaying…..

The famous gorilla ‘Guy’ was, of course, the most renowned resident, but I also saw the mountain gorilla ‘Reuben’ although, as a small child in those days, I didn’t appreciate just what a rare and important animals he was.

This building housed had a large and interesting primate collection; I especially remember an albino mona monkey which shared a cage with a red uakari monkey.
 
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