The Darling Downs Zoo is a privately owned facility situated some 2 hours drive west of Brisbane. It opened to the public in 2005 and is being developed on 50 acres of savannah grassland country.
The zoo is divided into four geographical zones and features animals from Australia, South-east Asia, Africa and the Americas.
The zoo is now a Full Institutional Member of ZAA and participates in some of the Association’s management programs. The zoo has imported animals in the past and quarantined them at other zoos – most recently two Hamadryas Baboons from Poland which were quarantined at Melbourne Zoo.
However, the Darling Downs Zoo has now developed a quarantine facility, which is licensed by DAFF Biosecurity, and has started quarantining it’s own imports as well as imports for other facilities.
In quarantine at the moment are ten juvenile Aldabra Giant Tortoises. Once they have completed their quarantine period they will form the nucleus of a breeding herd at the zoo. This is a long term project which may see their numbers added to by further imports. The current animals are all about 4 years old and weigh from nearly three kilograms to over 5 kilograms. They have settled well into quarantine and are all eating voraciously and gaining weight. The little Tortoises will complete their quarantine just in time for the Christmas holidays. As the whole importing process took well over two years to come to fruition, their well timed public debut is more due to good luck than good planning.
Steve Robinson, Director, Darling Downs Zoo
