Extremely exciting news from BZ today as they uncharacteristically put out a video and multiple sketches showing the plans for the Desert expansion.
I've analysed the sketches and such shown in the video and on the
official announcement page, and here's what we know:
- There will be a new entrance to the Desert, next to the entrance to the new elephant stables. Because the Desert 'deserves its own entrance'. Something I agree with, since the only two entrances right now are one through a cave in the Bush, and one hidden away in the Rimba exit:
- This will come out in the village area, in an already-existing hallway now used by staff:
Possibly most exciting is a new, open-topped enclosure in a similar style to the Mangrove's mudflat enclosure, housing "North American reptiles". Burgers' Zoo has Side-blotched lizards (Uta stansburiana) and Mojave desert tortoises (Gopherus agassizii) behind the scenes, but I expect Desert iguanas and Chuckwallas will also probably be in the mix.
This enclosure will be directly in front of the new entrance, and can be seen in the photo above. Here's a sketch on how the enclosure's barriers will work:
(^ note the smooth edges and climb-proof "cap" to the wall, which tortoises wouldn't need, but is necessary for climbing lizards)
There will also be a new enclosure in the style of a living room for Cactus deermice. There's already a very small group of these in one of the Desert's caves, so I assume/hope they will get a larger group for this much larger enclosure. Colorado river toads were also mentioned with this sketch, although I doubt that the two animals will be mixed:
Notes in Dutch:
- Small logs against ceiling
- Hole in the roof illusion
- Staircase
Table goes through viewing window:
- Guest immersion
- Table doubles as railing to prevent visitors bumping their head
- Keeps animals at guest eye height
There will be a new Red diamond rattlesnake terrarium, with a similar illusion as the current one. Looking out into the Desert. This sketch also reveals there will at least be new tunnels surrounding the new area:
Some notes:
- Above the visitor area is outside the Desert, so this will be inside a tunnel
- A canopy will be placed above the viewing window, so the visitors won't be able to see the roof of the terrarium, or the technical stuff. This is highly similar to
Wildlands' Dwarf mongoose enclosure.
- Above the terrarium it says "Terrace", so presumably this terrarium will be built into one of the pre-existing houses in the Desert, like this one, with the terrace on top:
Some additional sketches to other house style terrariums:
- The scaffolding I showed earlier will be to hang up dust screens to protect the Visitors and the desert from too much noise and dust pollution.
So:
- New open-topped reptile enclosure with at least the tortoises (not confirmed but I highly doubt they won't be here).
- At least 4 new, very large terrariums if the sketches all come to fruition.
- The movement of at least the Cactus deermice and Red diamond rattlesnakes, freeing up various terrariums in the caves. Meaning those terrariums will open up to possibly house even more new species.
- This is purely speculation on my part, but the Scorpion terrarium has been empty for quite a long time. Could be that they're waiting to finish this area before getting new scorpions. So either new scorpions in the new area, or a small renovation of the first cave/terrarium area.
