felis silvestris
Well-Known Member
I went on holiday to the Netherlands a few days ago. I and my family drove down to Newcastle, got on a ferry, went overnight to Amsterdam, then stayed there for a couple days. I was meant to be going to Artis yesterday, but due to the terrible weather it was closed. I decided then to go to Burger’s zoo, as we had now been staying in Heerde, with me staying in Sloterdijk before.
6.7.23
I got up at 9:00, had some granola for breakfast, got all sorted and drove there. It was very busy in the car park, and it took a while to find an empty space. It was around 11:30 when we arrived.
Entrance and Burger’s Park part 1
Upon entering, there are 3 nice statues of a White rhino, a giraffe and a silverback gorilla.
The entrance is rather neat, with several wooden viewing sections above turnstiles for staff, and a pretty average building for tickets. Immediately upon entering, you are greeted with a very attractive African Penguin enclosure. The enclosure has some nice rockwork, with the enclosure being multi-tiered and having several hidden shelter for the birds. A couple of nice pools with waterfalls and and having a nice hilly terrain makes it a pretty good enclosed overall. Unfortunately, the multi tiered terrain meant that a penguin fell off one of the hilly sections! I heard a loud thump and saw a penguin lying on the group, that stumbling sideways for a while. It looked dazed, but seemed to be alright. Heading up the hill and turning left, you have lots of plants on both sides. In general I found the zoo to have a lot of plants in the zoo, it made it feel a lot denser. Next, we came upon an enclosure for Asian elephants. The enclosure is built for two elderly cows, which had a decent enclosure for a pair, but was a bit smaller than the enclosure I saw for them at Chester. Both were active when I went past both times, reaching their trunks up for food. I unfortunately did not view the enclosure from the lower angle or see the indoor area, but it was a nice experience overall. I found that the signage here is probably the best I have seen for any zoo before. They have several signs for a species describing several aspects about the species, their behaviour, and sometimes interesting facts about them and things about individuals in the zoo. After this, I headed up to a nice island for Black and Ring-tailed lemur. The enclosure was on the large side, with plenty of plants and climbing frames. Both species were in their spacious indoor area the first time I went past, but were out the second time. Next up was a mixed enclosure for Coati and Squirrel monkey. The Coati were nowhere to be found, but there was several of the primate climbing on the many large trees and bushes they had full access to in the very large enclosure. Going past the Restaurant and indoor play area, I came to the Sri Lankan leopard enclosure. It was netted over, with two good viewing areas for the cats, dense foliage, attractive rock and a water feature running down the front. The cat was sleeping up high on a ledge with its tail hanging off the edge. The enclosure, which I have read used to hold Jackals, was empty, with only thing inside being a mouse. Close by them is a pretty standard paddock for Hog deer. It had some logs and a shelter for several individuals.
Burger’s Rimba
The Burger’s Rimba has very attractive entrance with path with bamboo walls on both sides. The first enclosure you see upon entering is mixed enclosure for Sun Bear and Binturong. The enclosure is large and well furnished, with lots of climbing opportunities and water. Amazingly, there was five bears in the enclosure. All were outside and very active, walking around and grooming one another. A Binturong was also active, yawning and washing itself while curled up at the corner of two branches. The indoor area also appeared to be quite nice, although no animals were in it. Next up was a mixed species enclosure for even more animals. On the ground are Banteng, more Hog deer, Eld’s deer (who were feeding on water plants in the moat) and Pig-tailed macaques. In the trees are a pair of Siamangs. The enclosure is very nice and good for all species. All of them were active, with the macaques having several young and running around, the deer feeding and relaxing, the siamangs swinging and eating a leek (but not calling, unfortunately), and the most notable being the banteng charging at the Sumatran tiger that was lying down and watching his would-be lunch from the other side of a high fence. Going down from there, we head into a cave-like area. Inside are two large and pretty good enclosures for Asian water monitor and Reticulated Python. I saw one of the former and two of the latter. Going through some more dense foliage, I came to a very large and tall cage for Buff-Cheeked gibbon. All four individuals were swinging around in their enclosure. Supposedly them and Dusky Leaf monkeys are rotated between there and an indoor enclosure that was closed off at the time, so I didn’t see the monkeys. After this is a massive enclosure for the tigers I was talking about earlier. It has a large pool at the front, with a relatively hilly terrain and plenty of dense bamboo throughout the enclosure. I saw one tiger lying down in the shade, but I’m not sure if it was the same individual watching the deer or not. There was multiple angles for this enclosure, which was very large and probably the best I’ve seen for Sumatran tigers. After this, we had a sit down near the café and had a picnic. After that, me and my sister went the surprisingly nice park right next to the road. Walking up to the next area after this, there is a tunnel with signs showing the timeline of the zoo, which was very interesting.
Burger’s Mangrove
Heading in, there was some nice signage about their conservation in Belize in which the enclosure was based on. There was also a glasses warmer in the shape of a manatee. Coming in, it is very warm and humid. There are thousands of butterflies flying around everywhere, some the size of small birds, landing of your shoulders every so often.
A large pool covers a decent section of the enclosure, housing three manatees and several fish species. It looked to be a pretty good enclosure for them, with the pool being large and deep. The mudflat for the crabs looked amazing. The crabs were walking around and showing off their claws. In general the whole enclosure was amazing and I don’t know if any zoo has a mangrove on this scale.
Burger’s Park part 2
Coming into the section, there is a tall and large aviary housing Black swans, Northern bald ibis and a vulture species I can’t remember the name of. The aviary was very good for the species in my opinion. On the other side, there is a standard but good enclosure for Swamp wallaby. They also had access to an enclosure with an empty pool, although I don’t know what was in here before. After this, you see several cages for different bird species. I went into their house, which was relatively nice, but didn’t have great viewing for them. There was also some terrariums for reptiles and a attractive fish tank in here too. After this, there is another viewing gallery for the two great ape species at the zoo. The first is for Chimpanzees, which is decent but not as good as the one I have seen at Edinburgh. There were a few in there, feeding and grooming each other. The next is for Gorillas, although it was closed off, saying they were all outside, though I’ve seen photos of it and it looks identical to the one for the chimps. Heading out of the building, you go up a nice viewing platform to see the chimpanzees on their huge island. The outdoors is dense, well furnished and very good enclosure for a large troop of the apes, of which I saw several foraging near the indoor area. Strangely, there is a massive tunnel going past the chimp island for the gorillas to access their enclosure, which is of similar size and held a troop of about eight gorillas, which hid under some the trees when it began to gently rain. There was also a male, who didn’t look fully grown, as he didn’t have a proper silver back and didn’t have the same builds as fully grown silverbacks. Going past Ocean, I headed through the forest to the next area- Burger’s Safari.
Burger’s Safari
There is a lot of green space in this area, with the high amounts of empty space between the few enclosures in this area having signs about wild species in the Zoo’s grounds and other wild species found in the Nederlands. The first enclosure you come across is a large, green enclosure for Cheetah, although they were nowhere to be seen. The signage in this enclosure and the next enclosure I will talk about had different to the other enclosures, and it seemed to be very good, although I couldn’t understand it as it was all in Dutch. There is a large viewing shelter to see both enclosures which are very good. The next enclosure was for African Lions, which is slightly larger than the one for Cheetah but slightly less dense snd more worn. There was six lions visible, three lionesses were resting, the male and another lioness were walking around and nuzzled one another, and the other lioness was unfortunately pacing slowly on the right hand side of the enclosure, which seemed to have a well-worn path on it. Coming round the corner, there is a small building showing some information about the zoo, some old pictures and some artefacts, including a stuffed tiger cub that presumably died at the zoo before. After this, there is a wide viewing area with a moat next to it. Inside this huge enclosure is the African Savanna. Two white rhinos were nearby, grazing and drinking from the moat. Another couple were walking a fair distance away. Some wildebeest were also visible. Heading back up, there was a large elevated viewing area, which you could see
the giraffe, waterbuck, zebra and the oryx and pelican in the distance. The savanna itself is massive, and has unusual terrain compared to others like it. Heading further along the walkway, there is what looked to be an African-themed restaurant, which was occupied by a group of people when I visited. There were a couple of men smoking outside the building, which was a bit disappointing to see. I headed past some more table to see that there was even more savanna. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find where the Giraffe house was. Heading past the restaurant, I headed into the Bush restaurant, where I had an almond magnum. After devouring that, I headed into one of the most famous tropical houses in the world.
Burger’s Bush
The Bush truly is a rainforest. As others have said about this exhibit, the many years of the Bush being around means that the plants have became very dense. There is a constant noise of many birds calling to one another, and the whole place itself is almost over-stimulating. There is a nice enclosure for Terrapins, fish and Capybara and from what I’ve heard, formerly the Manatee, which is quite nice for the species but looked like it would be pretty small for Manatee. There’s another enclosure for Asian Small-Clawed otters, which I didn’t see but heard their screams later on, one for Aardvarks which were invisible and an attractive but hard to view pond of Broad-Snouted Caiman, of which there was one resting at the corner of the enclosure. There is a strange wooden rope bridge over some water, which seemed very slippery so I decided not to since I didn’t want to get wet from Bush water. I wonder how many people have fallen in before. Just after this, my camera died. I had taken do many photos that it had killed it, luckily I could still use my phone camera. Heading through more dense plants, we went through to the Ocean, but would come back briefly later to see the waterfall, which was pretty grand indeed.
Burger’s Ocean
I just want to make this clear before talking about this: I don’t really have as much of an interest in fish and aquariums, so I might not appreciate some of the exhibits here as much as I should.
Coming into the exhibit, you start off at the shore, tide noises and all, with a nice tank with a large viewing area for the fish. There is an interesting sign about just how thick the glass in the tanks is. The glass in the biggest tank is 35 CM thick. Wow. Several others of the rocky tanks are also attractive. After a few of these, there is the main tank. It is absolutely massive, with many species of fish and sharks, and is apparently the largest coral reef outside of the wild. There is also a very cool underwater tunnel for stingrays after this. We then go into a mineshaft-like tunnel which is part of the final section I’ll talk about.
Burger’s Desert
As I said, you go through a long mineshaft. It is heavily themed. There is a special tunnel for kids to go through, which is pretty cool actually. Me and my sister went through it, although a scratched my side coming out of it, which was pretty sore. There are then a few smaller exhibits for Kangaroo rats (no show), Colorado toads, tarantulas and milk snakes. Coming into the main desert, there is a campfire themed exhibit for Rattlesnake and Gila monster, which you can see the open part behind it. After this part, you’re in the main desert. The first thing you see is a decent, sandy enclosure for Peccary, which the trio in the the enclosure were active and grunting loudly (I didn’t realise how big their teeth are!) There is lots of cacti and other desert plants here, which looks amazing. There is a Wild West themed food area, which was closed when we went through, as by that time it was after 5. There is also a large, hilly enclosure for Prairie Dog, Porcupine (no shows) and more peccary, of which I’ve heard this enclosure used to be inhabited by Bighorn Sheep. There are also vultures and several other bird species free roaming in the desert. There is harp wire enclosure for Bobcat, of which there was one right up at the front washing itself. The enclosure is pretty good for the cats, with plenty of privacy for them. We had to get home soon, so we headed home after this, unfortunately missing the roadrunner and Bats.
Final Thoughts
In the end, I throughly enjoyed Burger’s Zoo.
This and Chester are the best zoos I have seen so far. There were no enclosures that I found to be poor, many enclosures were fantastic and in general it was a great time. I would highly recommend visiting if you’re near it in the Netherlands. I have taken quite a lot of photos of it, though I will upload them once I get home. I’ll start making the review for Artis once I’ve visited
6.7.23
I got up at 9:00, had some granola for breakfast, got all sorted and drove there. It was very busy in the car park, and it took a while to find an empty space. It was around 11:30 when we arrived.
Entrance and Burger’s Park part 1
Upon entering, there are 3 nice statues of a White rhino, a giraffe and a silverback gorilla.
The entrance is rather neat, with several wooden viewing sections above turnstiles for staff, and a pretty average building for tickets. Immediately upon entering, you are greeted with a very attractive African Penguin enclosure. The enclosure has some nice rockwork, with the enclosure being multi-tiered and having several hidden shelter for the birds. A couple of nice pools with waterfalls and and having a nice hilly terrain makes it a pretty good enclosed overall. Unfortunately, the multi tiered terrain meant that a penguin fell off one of the hilly sections! I heard a loud thump and saw a penguin lying on the group, that stumbling sideways for a while. It looked dazed, but seemed to be alright. Heading up the hill and turning left, you have lots of plants on both sides. In general I found the zoo to have a lot of plants in the zoo, it made it feel a lot denser. Next, we came upon an enclosure for Asian elephants. The enclosure is built for two elderly cows, which had a decent enclosure for a pair, but was a bit smaller than the enclosure I saw for them at Chester. Both were active when I went past both times, reaching their trunks up for food. I unfortunately did not view the enclosure from the lower angle or see the indoor area, but it was a nice experience overall. I found that the signage here is probably the best I have seen for any zoo before. They have several signs for a species describing several aspects about the species, their behaviour, and sometimes interesting facts about them and things about individuals in the zoo. After this, I headed up to a nice island for Black and Ring-tailed lemur. The enclosure was on the large side, with plenty of plants and climbing frames. Both species were in their spacious indoor area the first time I went past, but were out the second time. Next up was a mixed enclosure for Coati and Squirrel monkey. The Coati were nowhere to be found, but there was several of the primate climbing on the many large trees and bushes they had full access to in the very large enclosure. Going past the Restaurant and indoor play area, I came to the Sri Lankan leopard enclosure. It was netted over, with two good viewing areas for the cats, dense foliage, attractive rock and a water feature running down the front. The cat was sleeping up high on a ledge with its tail hanging off the edge. The enclosure, which I have read used to hold Jackals, was empty, with only thing inside being a mouse. Close by them is a pretty standard paddock for Hog deer. It had some logs and a shelter for several individuals.
Burger’s Rimba
The Burger’s Rimba has very attractive entrance with path with bamboo walls on both sides. The first enclosure you see upon entering is mixed enclosure for Sun Bear and Binturong. The enclosure is large and well furnished, with lots of climbing opportunities and water. Amazingly, there was five bears in the enclosure. All were outside and very active, walking around and grooming one another. A Binturong was also active, yawning and washing itself while curled up at the corner of two branches. The indoor area also appeared to be quite nice, although no animals were in it. Next up was a mixed species enclosure for even more animals. On the ground are Banteng, more Hog deer, Eld’s deer (who were feeding on water plants in the moat) and Pig-tailed macaques. In the trees are a pair of Siamangs. The enclosure is very nice and good for all species. All of them were active, with the macaques having several young and running around, the deer feeding and relaxing, the siamangs swinging and eating a leek (but not calling, unfortunately), and the most notable being the banteng charging at the Sumatran tiger that was lying down and watching his would-be lunch from the other side of a high fence. Going down from there, we head into a cave-like area. Inside are two large and pretty good enclosures for Asian water monitor and Reticulated Python. I saw one of the former and two of the latter. Going through some more dense foliage, I came to a very large and tall cage for Buff-Cheeked gibbon. All four individuals were swinging around in their enclosure. Supposedly them and Dusky Leaf monkeys are rotated between there and an indoor enclosure that was closed off at the time, so I didn’t see the monkeys. After this is a massive enclosure for the tigers I was talking about earlier. It has a large pool at the front, with a relatively hilly terrain and plenty of dense bamboo throughout the enclosure. I saw one tiger lying down in the shade, but I’m not sure if it was the same individual watching the deer or not. There was multiple angles for this enclosure, which was very large and probably the best I’ve seen for Sumatran tigers. After this, we had a sit down near the café and had a picnic. After that, me and my sister went the surprisingly nice park right next to the road. Walking up to the next area after this, there is a tunnel with signs showing the timeline of the zoo, which was very interesting.
Burger’s Mangrove
Heading in, there was some nice signage about their conservation in Belize in which the enclosure was based on. There was also a glasses warmer in the shape of a manatee. Coming in, it is very warm and humid. There are thousands of butterflies flying around everywhere, some the size of small birds, landing of your shoulders every so often.
A large pool covers a decent section of the enclosure, housing three manatees and several fish species. It looked to be a pretty good enclosure for them, with the pool being large and deep. The mudflat for the crabs looked amazing. The crabs were walking around and showing off their claws. In general the whole enclosure was amazing and I don’t know if any zoo has a mangrove on this scale.
Burger’s Park part 2
Coming into the section, there is a tall and large aviary housing Black swans, Northern bald ibis and a vulture species I can’t remember the name of. The aviary was very good for the species in my opinion. On the other side, there is a standard but good enclosure for Swamp wallaby. They also had access to an enclosure with an empty pool, although I don’t know what was in here before. After this, you see several cages for different bird species. I went into their house, which was relatively nice, but didn’t have great viewing for them. There was also some terrariums for reptiles and a attractive fish tank in here too. After this, there is another viewing gallery for the two great ape species at the zoo. The first is for Chimpanzees, which is decent but not as good as the one I have seen at Edinburgh. There were a few in there, feeding and grooming each other. The next is for Gorillas, although it was closed off, saying they were all outside, though I’ve seen photos of it and it looks identical to the one for the chimps. Heading out of the building, you go up a nice viewing platform to see the chimpanzees on their huge island. The outdoors is dense, well furnished and very good enclosure for a large troop of the apes, of which I saw several foraging near the indoor area. Strangely, there is a massive tunnel going past the chimp island for the gorillas to access their enclosure, which is of similar size and held a troop of about eight gorillas, which hid under some the trees when it began to gently rain. There was also a male, who didn’t look fully grown, as he didn’t have a proper silver back and didn’t have the same builds as fully grown silverbacks. Going past Ocean, I headed through the forest to the next area- Burger’s Safari.
Burger’s Safari
There is a lot of green space in this area, with the high amounts of empty space between the few enclosures in this area having signs about wild species in the Zoo’s grounds and other wild species found in the Nederlands. The first enclosure you come across is a large, green enclosure for Cheetah, although they were nowhere to be seen. The signage in this enclosure and the next enclosure I will talk about had different to the other enclosures, and it seemed to be very good, although I couldn’t understand it as it was all in Dutch. There is a large viewing shelter to see both enclosures which are very good. The next enclosure was for African Lions, which is slightly larger than the one for Cheetah but slightly less dense snd more worn. There was six lions visible, three lionesses were resting, the male and another lioness were walking around and nuzzled one another, and the other lioness was unfortunately pacing slowly on the right hand side of the enclosure, which seemed to have a well-worn path on it. Coming round the corner, there is a small building showing some information about the zoo, some old pictures and some artefacts, including a stuffed tiger cub that presumably died at the zoo before. After this, there is a wide viewing area with a moat next to it. Inside this huge enclosure is the African Savanna. Two white rhinos were nearby, grazing and drinking from the moat. Another couple were walking a fair distance away. Some wildebeest were also visible. Heading back up, there was a large elevated viewing area, which you could see
the giraffe, waterbuck, zebra and the oryx and pelican in the distance. The savanna itself is massive, and has unusual terrain compared to others like it. Heading further along the walkway, there is what looked to be an African-themed restaurant, which was occupied by a group of people when I visited. There were a couple of men smoking outside the building, which was a bit disappointing to see. I headed past some more table to see that there was even more savanna. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find where the Giraffe house was. Heading past the restaurant, I headed into the Bush restaurant, where I had an almond magnum. After devouring that, I headed into one of the most famous tropical houses in the world.
Burger’s Bush
The Bush truly is a rainforest. As others have said about this exhibit, the many years of the Bush being around means that the plants have became very dense. There is a constant noise of many birds calling to one another, and the whole place itself is almost over-stimulating. There is a nice enclosure for Terrapins, fish and Capybara and from what I’ve heard, formerly the Manatee, which is quite nice for the species but looked like it would be pretty small for Manatee. There’s another enclosure for Asian Small-Clawed otters, which I didn’t see but heard their screams later on, one for Aardvarks which were invisible and an attractive but hard to view pond of Broad-Snouted Caiman, of which there was one resting at the corner of the enclosure. There is a strange wooden rope bridge over some water, which seemed very slippery so I decided not to since I didn’t want to get wet from Bush water. I wonder how many people have fallen in before. Just after this, my camera died. I had taken do many photos that it had killed it, luckily I could still use my phone camera. Heading through more dense plants, we went through to the Ocean, but would come back briefly later to see the waterfall, which was pretty grand indeed.
Burger’s Ocean
I just want to make this clear before talking about this: I don’t really have as much of an interest in fish and aquariums, so I might not appreciate some of the exhibits here as much as I should.
Coming into the exhibit, you start off at the shore, tide noises and all, with a nice tank with a large viewing area for the fish. There is an interesting sign about just how thick the glass in the tanks is. The glass in the biggest tank is 35 CM thick. Wow. Several others of the rocky tanks are also attractive. After a few of these, there is the main tank. It is absolutely massive, with many species of fish and sharks, and is apparently the largest coral reef outside of the wild. There is also a very cool underwater tunnel for stingrays after this. We then go into a mineshaft-like tunnel which is part of the final section I’ll talk about.
Burger’s Desert
As I said, you go through a long mineshaft. It is heavily themed. There is a special tunnel for kids to go through, which is pretty cool actually. Me and my sister went through it, although a scratched my side coming out of it, which was pretty sore. There are then a few smaller exhibits for Kangaroo rats (no show), Colorado toads, tarantulas and milk snakes. Coming into the main desert, there is a campfire themed exhibit for Rattlesnake and Gila monster, which you can see the open part behind it. After this part, you’re in the main desert. The first thing you see is a decent, sandy enclosure for Peccary, which the trio in the the enclosure were active and grunting loudly (I didn’t realise how big their teeth are!) There is lots of cacti and other desert plants here, which looks amazing. There is a Wild West themed food area, which was closed when we went through, as by that time it was after 5. There is also a large, hilly enclosure for Prairie Dog, Porcupine (no shows) and more peccary, of which I’ve heard this enclosure used to be inhabited by Bighorn Sheep. There are also vultures and several other bird species free roaming in the desert. There is harp wire enclosure for Bobcat, of which there was one right up at the front washing itself. The enclosure is pretty good for the cats, with plenty of privacy for them. We had to get home soon, so we headed home after this, unfortunately missing the roadrunner and Bats.
Final Thoughts
In the end, I throughly enjoyed Burger’s Zoo.
This and Chester are the best zoos I have seen so far. There were no enclosures that I found to be poor, many enclosures were fantastic and in general it was a great time. I would highly recommend visiting if you’re near it in the Netherlands. I have taken quite a lot of photos of it, though I will upload them once I get home. I’ll start making the review for Artis once I’ve visited
. The route through the tall rocks and into the restaurant area is a shortcut meant for people who really need the toilet... The main route goes through the rocky path to the left, which brings you past the Roadrunner/Burrowing owl aviary, the canyon aviary with the Socorro dove breeding pair, the first Ringtail habitat and the Cactus deermouse terrarium. 