Auckland Zoo Auckland Zoo News 2016

When an exhibit opens but remains closed...

Auckland Zoo's new Pridelands extension will open tomorrow, except for most of it...

Story here: African savannah development opens

Auckland Zoo's new $7m African savannah opens to the public on Good Friday. Our large flock of African lovebirds however, are taking a little longer than expected to settle into their new home.

To give these delicate birds the extra time and space they need to familiarise themselves with their new environment, the opening of the walkthrough aviary section of this new area (also home to our leopard tortoises, and some of our meerkats and the meerkat tunnels) has been postponed.

We will be opening the aviary to visitors as soon as our bird experts are confident the lovebirds are ready, and will let everyone know with updates on our website, on our Facebook page and via our email newsletters.

"The new African savannah aviary is the second largest in the Zoo and provides our resident flock of lovebirds with a huge and highly complex environment," says Auckland Zoo's curator of Birds and Ectotherms, Richard Gibson

"We are certain they will be very happy and breed successfully here, but it's going to take them a little time to get used to their new surroundings, and when it comes to the health and well-being of our animals, we're always going to err on the side of caution".

As well as exploring the rest of the Zoo, visitors who are coming in over the Easter weekend can still look forward to exploring other areas of the new African savannah.

These include seeing the smaller meerkat group, and from a stunning new ground-level wildlife hide, looking out over the new watering hole to see giraffe, zebra and ostrich. These animals can also be viewed from the aerial viewing platforms alongside the new rock amphitheatre beside the savannah.

Visitors can follow the aviary by-pass walkway to check out the new African village school yard that has vistas across to giraffe, zebra, ostrich, rhino and springbok, enter the lion viewing shelter, and access the rest of the Zoo's Africa precinct.​
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Here is a link to a very cool document: http://www.aucklandzoo.co.nz/about/Documents/Auckland-Zoo-10-year-plan.pdf
It has a timeline of the zoos 10 year development plan. Lots of cool info in there about the Asian Precint: looks like it will include the orangutans, Tigers, otters, and siamags. (There is a little sketch of the possible orangutan enclosure.) Also things like a free flight flamingo aviary, and underwater viewing for the hippos! Definitely go and check it out! :)
 
ZooBoyNZ said:
Here is a link to a very cool document: http://www.aucklandzoo.co.nz/about/Documents/Auckland-Zoo-10-year-plan.pdf
It has a timeline of the zoos 10 year development plan. Lots of cool info in there about the Asian Precint: looks like it will include the orangutans, Tigers, otters, and siamags. (There is a little sketch of the possible orangutan enclosure.) Also things like a free flight flamingo aviary, and underwater viewing for the hippos! Definitely go and check it out! :)
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Sounds good, and largely the path I expected the Zoo to go down, although I hadn't expected a Flamingo aviary. I did predict the Lemur walk-through at the entrance though! Very exciting developments though, and I hope the Wild Asia exhibit is done very well, with more species than the four currently listed (especially birds and perhaps Komodo Dragons).

The Zoo also has a new map, showing what the layout of the new Pridelands extension looks like. Seems to take up half the giraffe enclosure, but that's just the scale. I didn't realise the aviary was now the Zoo's second largest, it must be a good size.

The Australian aviary is closed for the rest of the year, reopening in 2017. I wonder if the reptile exhibits will be located in this area too then? According to the 10 year plan, there will be a freshwater and forest exhibit added, housing "giant lizards" and "freshwater turtles". I don't think Auckland has had any turtles on display for a while now, which is surprising really, so it will be good to have them back.
 
Yes, I'm very excited to see how everything turns out. I have been constantly going on Auckland Zoos website to see if a new map is up showing the pridelands development! I will check it out now. I'm very interested to see the design for the new orangutan and tiger exhibits. From that sketch in the 10 year plan of the orangutan exhibit, it looks like they might be going down the path of a similar design to Hamiltons new siamang enclosure; a floating board walk looking out over the water in the enclosure maybe? And the tiger exhibit; I wonder what this will be like...
 
ZooBoyNZ said:
Yes, I'm very excited to see how everything turns out. I have been constantly going on Auckland Zoos website to see if a new map is up showing the pridelands development! I will check it out now. I'm very interested to see the design for the new orangutan and tiger exhibits. From that sketch in the 10 year plan of the orangutan exhibit, it looks like they might be going down the path of a similar design to Hamiltons new siamang enclosure; a floating board walk looking out over the water in the enclosure maybe? And the tiger exhibit; I wonder what this will be like...
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I think the Orangutan sketch is unlikely to be informative, and that relatively little of the design work has been done yet. I am hoping to see large exhibits, with lots of elevation both for Orangutans and visitors. Will be interesting to see what they do about the tigers, if they will largely stay as they are and just be linked to Wild Asia, or if they will be given totally new enclosures too.
 
zooboy28 said:
Will be interesting to see what they do about the tigers, if they will largely stay as they are and just be linked to Wild Asia, or if they will be given totally new enclosures too.
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I'd expect them to replace the pit enclosure entirely but only make minor alterations to the newer glass-fronted exhibit.
 
driftaguy said:
I'd expect them to replace the pit enclosure entirely but only make minor alterations to the newer glass-fronted exhibit.
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Do you think they will replace it? I really like that exhibit, its a good size and is more or less the only historical exhibit left in the zoo. It could certainly be improved though. If it was up to me, I'd be keen to install ground-level viewing from an underground cave-type area at the Lake level. That would be pretty awesome. But I don't know if that would be feasible.
 
Sad news - taken from the zoos Facebook:

We're extremely sad to share that our much-loved male hippo Fudge has died.

Normally energetic with a great appetite, Fudge (28), had been showing signs of illness over the past few days – being uncharacteristically lethargic and off his food.

His cause of death is unknown, and a full post-mortem is to be carried out to investigate.

Fudge was born at Auckland Zoo in 1988, and is survived by his 40-year-old mother Faith, also born here at Auckland Zoo.
Our thoughts go out to all our staff and volunteers and everyone who loved Fudge, especially to our amazing team of Pridelands keepers who cared so passionately for him
 
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oh that is really sad! Faith is now the sole hippo left in NZ, although hopefully she will still be round for a lot more years.
 
This is very sad news. Poor Faith and Fudge. :(

I guess importation of hippos is currently prohibited? But hopefully the importation of a couple of new animals is a priority for Auckland Zoo. I don;t think Faith is the friendliest hippo though, so integration could be difficult. Regardless, a one-hippo country is not acceptable.
 
zooboy28 said:
This is very sad news. Poor Faith and Fudge. :(

I guess importation of hippos is currently prohibited? But hopefully the importation of a couple of new animals is a priority for Auckland Zoo. I don;t think Faith is the friendliest hippo though, so integration could be difficult. Regardless, a one-hippo country is not acceptable.
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There doesn't seem to be a current IHS for hippos unfortunately.
 
zooboy28 said:
Do you think they will replace it? I really like that exhibit, its a good size and is more or less the only historical exhibit left in the zoo. It could certainly be improved though. If it was up to me, I'd be keen to install ground-level viewing from an underground cave-type area at the Lake level. That would be pretty awesome. But I don't know if that would be feasible.
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When I did a private encounter for the Galapagos tortoises in 2012, my tour guide (who's worked at the zoo for a long time) said that the original plan for the tigers was to fill the pit enclosure up and have an exhibit called tiger trail or something. Instead they just went with the new enclosure at the time. So I'm thinking maybe they'll go with that idea for the new South East Asian precinct.
 
Two female Little Blue Penguins have been added to the Zoo's shorebird exhibit, according to Facebook:

Meet our new rescue penguin girls, who have just moved in with the rest of our penguin colony after months of specialist care from our vet team.

In January, a suspected dog bite and boat strike saw one lose a flipper and the other sustained a permanently immobile flipper and fractured toe that needed partial amputation.
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There is more info and photos here: Help keep our penguins safe
 
I think there were about 5 Macaques out in the enclosure.

And the Springbok are still there.
 
Tygo said:
Visited Auckland Zoo today and the Bonnet Macaque are back on display in the old Chimpanzee/ Orangutan enclosure.
And two female Nyala were off display out the back of Pridelands. Nyala are also now shown on the map in with the Rhino enclosure.
http://www.aucklandzoo.co.nz/explore-the-zoo/Documents/auckland-zoo-map.pdf
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Very interesting news - has the exhibit changed much to accommodate the macaques - photos please!

Also, was there any sign of any other developments - what is happening with the Lorikeet aviary?
 
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