Chessington Zoo Chessington Zoo News 2024

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Smaggledagle

Smaggledagle

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Concerning rumours on Twitter/X that Chessington are starting to phase out their animal collection including gorillas and big cats. Anyone know anything to substantiate this speculation?
 

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If you read the further comments. They clarify things slightly more

The zoo is *not* closing
 

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I know exactly how this has come about as the theme park vloggers that mentioned it I watch, they are very "in the know" with all things merlin. The exact wording they used was "if you want to see the animals then you should come sooner rather then later". Also a comment on there video said some unused enclosures have already been taken down. I think we can expect an announcement soon and I do believe Chessington will be scaling down there collection, possibly the larger animals.
 
tennisfan said:
Public consultation launched by Chessington World of Adventures today.

https://www.cwoa-consultation.com/
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Main thing to note in regard to the collection:

Some of the animals are to be moved to a dedicated area in Wanyama Village and Reserve from their current homes. The lorikeets are to be relocated here from Wild Asia as part of Project Refresh and Renew, and other animals are also to be relocated here.
 
redpanda36 said:
I have been told by numerous officials that the gorillas, lions and tigers will be leaving the collection over the next 2-3 years. It seems to have been quite a shock for the staff.
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If this turns out to be correct then I presume the intention is to relocate all(?) the major species away from this part of the park and focus on the Wanyama Village/reserve area instead. Building fresh accomodation for Gorillas (which has been talked about previously but has never happened so far) and the big cats would be a big expense, maybe they have decided not to do that.
 
I’m very interested to see what happens to their gorillas. They have a fairly large multigenerational troop with a youngster so I’d imagine the EEP would be keen for the troop to move together rather than splitting them up. But who can take on a whole troop of gorillas right now? I believe they have a couple of older female offspring that could potentially be moved elsewhere to join other troops.
 
jtrbmvcq said:
I’m very interested to see what happens to their gorillas. They have a fairly large multigenerational troop with a youngster so I’d imagine the EEP would be keen for the troop to move together rather than splitting them up. But who can take on a whole troop of gorillas right now? I believe they have a couple of older female offspring that could potentially be moved elsewhere to join other troops.
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This is almost a surefire repeat of what happened some years/decades ago now when it was rumoured either the whole park was closing, or at least all the animals dispensed with. Suddenly a whole gorilla group would become available- its been this sort of size for a long while now. At that time Chester were rumoured to be interested in having them. But then nothing happened and everything stayed the same at Chessington.

Again as you say its likely EEP would prefer the group of 10 animals to move altogether, though females Kuenza(b 2012) and Kipande(b 2018) are still living in their natal group. As are the two castrated males but they'll be expected to stay in it for life.

It takes a comparatively wealthy zoo to build the expensive accomodation needed to house Great Apes and I imagine possible homes in the UK might be restricted to places like Chester, Colchester or YWP. But of course a move to Europe would also be possible. All this is speculation obviously and depending on whether this news turns out to be correct.

On a different note, didn't the tigers already move to a better enclosure or am I wrong there?
 
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I wonder if YWP have the funds to pick up their gorilla facility plans from a couple of years ago… I could imagine them doing gorillas well and a Great Ape is the biggest (Mammalian) thing missing from their collection. I don’t believe Chester will be in position to get gorillas for a good while, at least until they have built a new chimp facility. And like you mentioned, Colchester are keen to get gorillas I believe as part of their ambitious future plans. I would half wager that we could see Kuenza, Kipande or both end up at Jersey once their new gorilla facility is complete.
 
jtrbmvcq said:
I wonder if YWP have the funds to pick up their gorilla facility plans from a couple of years ago… I could imagine them doing gorillas well and a Great Ape is the biggest (Mammalian) thing missing from their collection. I don’t believe Chester will be in position to get gorillas for a good while, at least until they have built a new chimp facility. And like you mentioned, Colchester are keen to get gorillas I believe as part of their ambitious future plans. I would half wager that we could see Kuenza, Kipande or both end up at Jersey once their new gorilla facility is complete.
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Yes, I imagine YWP or Colchester might be the most likely- both have indicated interest in the recent past- Colchester still do I think. Chester have definately stated they won't get them, though things sometimes change. If a move does come to fruition I rather hope they stay in the UK.

Chessington's enclosure is quite aged and rather scruffy-looking nowadays and has no internal viewing for the public at all. But its a sucessful group breeding wise and has been controlled to some extent. The only current breeding female is Shangha but at least one of her three babies(Kuenza?), maybe more than one of them, was born as a result of failed contraception.

The two young females in the Chessington group could very easily move to Jersey- that seems a likely option after the new house is built. Or possibly it could be the two younger females, Meisie and Moanda at Blackpool who are also still living in their natal group. I don't understand why they haven't been moved already, Moanda is now 14 years old.
 
Pertinax said:
Yes, I imagine YWP or Colchester might be the most likely- both have indicated interest in the recent past- Colchester still do I think. Chester have definately stated they won't get them, though things sometimes change. If a move does come to fruition I rather hope they stay in the UK.

Chessington's enclosure is quite aged and rather scruffy-looking nowadays and has no internal viewing for the public at all. But its a sucessful group breeding wise and has been controlled to some extent. The only current breeding female is Shangha but at least one of her three babies(Kuenza?), maybe more than one of them, was born as a result of failed contraception.

The two young females in the Chessington group could very easily move to Jersey- that seems a likely option after the new house is built. Or possibly it could be the two younger females, Meisie and Moanda at Blackpool who are also still living in their natal group. I don't understand why they haven't been moved already, Moanda is now 14 years old.
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It’s unclear why Blackpool’s two young females haven’t been moved on - there’s lots of places around Europe able to house them, worth noting it’s Meisie who is fourteen (born in 2010) whilst Moanda is twelve (born in 2012) :p
 
Although Colchester have indicated that they want to get gorillas in the future, the one thing that I think would mean they aren't the potential destination for the Chessington animals is that there really isn't anywhere to put them, unless they were going to be crammed into the probably unsuitable former bear dens. The planned gorilla enclosure is part of the zoo's massive expansion plans, which haven't been approved yet.
 
Baringogiraffe12 said:
It’s unclear why Blackpool’s two young females haven’t been moved on - there’s lots of places around Europe able to house them, worth noting it’s Meisie who is fourteen (born in 2010) whilst Moanda is twelve (born in 2012) :p
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Yes the older one is Meisie, just a typing error there.
 
DesertRhino150 said:
Although Colchester have indicated that they want to get gorillas in the future, the one thing that I think would mean they aren't the potential destination for the Chessington animals is that there really isn't anywhere to put them, unless they were going to be crammed into the probably unsuitable former bear dens. The planned gorilla enclosure is part of the zoo's massive expansion plans, which haven't been approved yet.
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It's propably a case of where would be prepared to build an enclosure for them,that is if they became available.
 
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