Dangerous enclosures...

NZ Jeremy

NZ Jeremy

Well-Known Member
Carrying on from the "scariest moments in a zoo" thread, I thought I'd start one where you are actually worried a motivated animal may escape...

My example, the old pit at Auckland Zoo which now houses Sumatran tigers but was originally designed for lions... It has a very low point in the wall where I believe the big male could get out if he really desired...
 
That's a good question. I can't think of any off the top of my head that I've seen here in the UK, but there is a photo in the gallery of an alligator pool with a very low perimeter wall.
 
Unless we're going by bitten fingers, I know one enclosure that's more dangerous from keeping the public from the animals! Whilst Cotswold Wildlife Park has a large and decent meerkat enclosure, the fence is very low, only coming about knee height on me. Anyone could step over it and become part of the animal-theft problem.
 
Breeding exhibit in Jong's crocodile park in Kuching is dangerous I don't think I'll ever go back into there after what I went through...
 
The jaguar enclosure at Dartmoor has a very narrow moat and no roof, and the tiger enclosure at the same zoo is more of a pit, and has a wall of only about 8 feet at one point.
Also, the elephants in WMSP are contained by 1 strand of hotwire at the back of the enclosure, which I doubt would hold an annoyed bull elephant.
 
ashley-h said:
The jaguar enclosure at Dartmoor has a very narrow moat and no roof, and the tiger enclosure at the same zoo is more of a pit, and has a wall of only about 8 feet at one point.
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eight feet!!? Isn't that about the height of a tiger standing on its hind legs!?
 
Toronto Zoo is kind of scary at times because in the meerkat and pygmy hippo exhibits,there are very low glass windows which are alkso very thin.I know people can stick there arms over and the animals often rest near these.Also,the indoor marmoset exhibit has a curving second barrier to "keep people away" from the mesh but it gets close near the edges and people can stick there fingers through
 
ashley-h said:
The jaguar enclosure at Dartmoor has a very narrow moat and no roof, and the tiger enclosure at the same zoo is more of a pit, and has a wall of only about 8 feet at one point.
Click to expand...

Sounds like you should call the nearest WAZA authority...
 
Tiger mountain at Dartmoor (the bigger of the two enclosures) does not curently contain any tigers. When i asked why, a keeper told me that the council had said that they had to make the fences fifteen feet tall before they would be allowed to keep any tigers in the enclosure. According to him, they are already twelve feet - not so sure in some places!
 
tiger mountain at dartmoor was built for cheetah, hence the low fencing and small doorways into the house. It was supposed to be a temporary holding pen for the surplus of tiger cubs. Although various modifications have been made to make the enclosure safe..it is still not safe for such large cats! Im amazed the zoo inspectors didnt pick up on this nearly 2 years ago when the park was re licenced under the new owners!

The jaguar enclosure was built in 1988 and was the first of this type of enclosure for jags in the uk. There have never been any escapes! The fence and over hang are hotwired.
 
Jacks zoo, do you know when tiger mountain (cheetah mountain then, i suppose) was built - the other tiger enclosure and jaguar enclosure have plaques but tiger mountain doesn't. I find it interesting that the council say that the enclosure needs 15 foot fences as nearby paignton's are only 12. The nature of tiger mountain would make the 15 foot fence line very difficult as two of the sides are the walls leading down in, presumably, they will make the ground around the wall deeper. Ideal solution...put cheetah back into the enclosure!

BTW, does anyone know what has happened to tamsin, the tiger who was at tiger rock. When i went, the tiger mountain three were in there and i couldn't find a keeper to ask. They may be on rotation.
 
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Zoogoer2000 said:
Toronto Zoo is kind of scary at times because in the meerkat and pygmy hippo exhibits,there are very low glass windows which are alkso very thin.I know people can stick there arms over and the animals often rest near these.Also,the indoor marmoset exhibit has a curving second barrier to "keep people away" from the mesh but it gets close near the edges and people can stick there fingers through
Click to expand...

You can also quite easily get to the Perswalski's (sp?) horses exhibit by ducking under the plastic chain-link fence...and likewise in African Savannah, you can get to right up to the fence of the Zebra enclosure. The Arctic Wolf exhibit has always made me nervous, teenagers and adults can easily hop that fence.

Ironically, I found the pig enclosure in the kid's zoo very dangerous. I saw a child hop the fence INTO the pig enclosure, run a lap, and come back out (animals were in the barn, but still). A child was also bitten by the pigs...
 
I noticed that about those enclosures as well, Leptonyx.

When they had the llamas, there was no stand-off barrier either. There are a lot of zoos with llamas in petting zoos but still.

There was a wolf bite incident in the current enclosure, I believe just as there was one with they were in the polar bear's maternity den (and the zoo rewarded the "victim" with ten million dollars). With people being sue happy, I hope that the new exhibit is as visitor proof as can get. A strand of electric wire between the barrier and enclosure should suffice ;)

Wow, didn't know there was a pig bite at the zoo :eek:

Leptonyx said:
You can also quite easily get to the Perswalski's (sp?) horses exhibit by ducking under the plastic chain-link fence...and likewise in African Savannah, you can get to right up to the fence of the Zebra enclosure. The Arctic Wolf exhibit has always made me nervous, teenagers and adults can easily hop that fence.

Ironically, I found the pig enclosure in the kid's zoo very dangerous. I saw a child hop the fence INTO the pig enclosure, run a lap, and come back out (animals were in the barn, but still). A child was also bitten by the pigs...
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And also at Cotswold, there's a very low electric fence for the bactrian camels that can easilly be stepped over.
 
jacks zoo said:
There have never been any escapes!
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There was an escape a few days after ben bought the zoo, but that was because of a keeper's blunder rather than the barriers (a shutter wasn't locked). I believe sovereign, the male jag, ended up in an enclosure with the tigers and had to be lured into their house before being sedated and moved back to his own enclosure.
 
The lion moat at Leipzig zoo looks eminently jumpable. I'm told there are no worries because the lions are old and fat. What about the next group? I spent my childhood walking past the SF zoo moat from which Tatiana the tiger vaulted last year--for 70 years it worked fine, one group of idiots later it didn't......
 
@reduakari: The young lions didn't jump over the moat when in the exhibit. Let's see whether the lions Leipzig tries to get from Ethopia will be more "jumpy"...;)
 
Meaghan Edwards said:
I noticed that about those enclosures as well, Leptonyx.

When they had the llamas, there was no stand-off barrier either. There are a lot of zoos with llamas in petting zoos but still.

There was a wolf bite incident in the current enclosure, I believe just as there was one with they were in the polar bear's maternity den (and the zoo rewarded the "victim" with ten million dollars). With people being sue happy, I hope that the new exhibit is as visitor proof as can get. A strand of electric wire between the barrier and enclosure should suffice ;)

Wow, didn't know there was a pig bite at the zoo :eek:
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Thankfully- the alpacas are pretty antisocial :) We got a new one over the summer, but he's only been at the front within arms reach two or three times. I have no idea how severe the pig bite was...I just saw the barriers being set up after it had happened.

I guess the only question is whether we're talking about "dangerous" exhibits or "idiot proof" exhibits...if we went with the latter this thread could probably go on infinitely :rolleyes: I for one want to know how someone managed to get to the polar bears...
 
It may just be my paranoia but there was a cassowary exhibit at Avifauna in the Netherlands that had a low and rather unsubstantial fence. I believe there was a male in the enclosure with a couple of chicks. I had always been told how dangerous these birds are so I kept my distance!
 
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