High altitude species in hot weather

elefante

elefante

Well-Known Member
15+ year member
It's been a brutally hot summer in North Dakota and I got to thinking about zoo animals here. The Dakota Zoo for example, has several species native to high mountains such as snow leopards, Dall's sheep, bighorn sheep, mountain goats, and I believe Transcaspian urial. They just have simple shelters for winter, and while they have shade, they don't have what appears to be much else for cooling. Does the heat just not bother species like that very much? Are there zoos in year round warm climates that keep species like this in similar conditions? I know San Diego has caribou and from what I understand they do fine. Is it the same with the species I mentioned?
 
Mountain species are unique in the animal world in that they are often adapted to survive in a huge variety of climates and not just cold. On a single mountain, you can experience snow, rain, intense heat, wind, and other weather conditions in a single day. Because of this, they are probably some of the most resilient species in zoos. Now this is different for tundra species as their climate is not as harshly variable in a short period of time so those animals tend to have more difficult times in consistently warm climates. Example being polar bears in many zoos, musk ox that were recently euthanized at the Minnesota Zoo, etc.
 
Echobeast said:
Mountain species are unique in the animal world in that they are often adapted to survive in a huge variety of climates and not just cold. On a single mountain, you can experience snow, rain, intense heat, wind, and other weather conditions in a single day. Because of this, they are probably some of the most resilient species in zoos. Now this is different for tundra species as their climate is not as harshly variable in a short period of time so those animals tend to have more difficult times in consistently warm climates. Example being polar bears in many zoos, musk ox that were recently euthanized at the Minnesota Zoo, etc.
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Makes sense. I didn't know the musk oxen were euthanized in Minnesota. The summers there are NOT suitable for musk oxen but sad to see them euthanized.
 
elefante said:
Makes sense. I didn't know the musk oxen were euthanized in Minnesota. The summers there are NOT suitable for musk oxen but sad to see them euthanized.
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The last few were elderly and in distress from the increasingly warm summers. So it’s not like they just euthanized healthy young animals. But they made the right decision phasing them out.
 
nczoofan said:
The last few were elderly and in distress from the increasingly warm summers. So it’s not like they just euthanized healthy young animals. But they made the right decision phasing them out.
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I understand that, I was just saying it was too bad it came down to that.
 
itsallfaction said:
The snow leopards in Taman Safari Indonesia.
Which I personally think is complete against animal welfare.
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That sounds awful. I've also questioned keeping Amur leopards in places like Florida but apparently they don't mind too much and still breed.
 
itsallfaction said:
The snow leopards in Taman Safari Indonesia.
Which I personally think is complete against animal welfare.
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If I remembered it correctly, TSI is located in forests of Cisarua with relatively high altitude though? I'm pretty sure Snow Leopards can adjust to the cooler climate of Bogor.

The Giant Pandas are also located in higher altitude area, which were farther than the main area.
 
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