Hirola in captivity

[Panthera1981]

Good morning everyone!

I'm interested to know the current status of the Hirola in zoos. I'm aware that it was quite a common animal to find once but, for whatever reason, has mostly disappeared.

With its current perilous state in the wild, are there plans to start new programmes? Is it difficult to keep hartebeest-type antelope in a zoo environment?

Many thanks!

 

[Tim Brown]

Without checking,the last one in captivity was I believe at Gladys Porter Zoo in Brownsville, Texas - it died a few years ago.I was lucky enough to see it - kept off-show it was one of the most bad tempered zoo animals ive ever encountered.The zoo did breed the species on more than one occasion.Longevity records for Alcephalus and Damaliscus are good,so I don't really know why they have fallen out of favour.It may be that they are not good "mixers" in multi=species savannah exhibits.

 

[bongorob]

They have also been bred at Dvůr Králové in the past.

 

[vogelcommando]

The only other place in Europe were it has been kept is the almost completly unknown collection Freizeit Zoo Fliegenpilz in Germany which had at least one in 1977. The zoo doesn't exist anymore ( closed 2001 ) and I wasn't able to find anymore information about the animal(s) kept there.

 

[ungulate nerd]

Besides Gladys Porter Zoo, other United States zoos that kept Hirola (Beatragus hunteri) in the past included the following facilities

Dallas Zoo
San Diego Zoo
San Diego Wild Animal Park
Los Angeles Zoo
And
Busch Gardens Tampa

At the San Diego Zoo, they were kept in Horn and Hoof Mesa, but I dont know exactly which exhibit

At the Los Angeles Zoo, they were kept in a 3 different places, 1 place was the grassy hillside paddock that currently holds Lesser kudu (Tragelaphus imberbis), that exhibit held 1 male and several females, the other exhibit was where the Masai giraffes (Giraffa cameleopardus tippelskirchi) currently live, 1 male lived with the giraffes. They were also in the row of hoofstock paddocks that holds species like Spekes gazelle (Gazella spekeii) and Chocoan peccary (Catogonus wagneri), like Gladys Porter Zoo, Los Angeles Zoo actually bred their Hirola (Beatragus hunteri)

At the San Diego Wild Animal Park, they were in one of the multi acre field exhibits, but I dont know exactly which one

At the Gladys Porter Zoo, besides being off exhibit, they were in the paddock that currently holds Grants zebra (Equus quagga boehmi) and Beisa oryx (Oryx beisa beisa)

As for Dallas Zoo and Busch Gardens Tampa, I dont know which parts of those zoos they were held

Sadly, the Kenyan government placed a ban on the import of Hirola (Beatragus hunteri) from their country, but I think I remember hearing about a semi captive breeding population of them, can anyone confirm this ?

@Tim Brown, do you by any chance have any exact dates as to when that Hirola (Beatragus hunteri) at GPZ died ?

 

[Kifaru Bwana]

Zoo Dvur Kralove had the most succesful captive-breeding program.
(their demise was brought about by a bogey national veterinary health exercise / operation).


The semi captive-breeding being referred to is a Conservancy in north-eastern Kenya.

 

[Batto]

Good morning everyone!

(...)for whatever reason, has mostly disappeared.
(...) Is it difficult to keep hartebeest-type antelope in a zoo environment?

Just my 2 cents: the Subfamily Alcelaphinae in general doesn't have the greatest reputation when it comes to zoo husbandry. "Bad temper" aka intra-and interspecific aggressiveness and "nuttiness" aka fleetingness even after long years in captivity are some of the things commonly heard when talking about their husbandry. As far as I remember, the last hirola at GP was quite "meshuga" in the end, constantly hitting its head.
All in all, the two wildebeest species and bontebok subspecies are actually the only ones that more or less established themselves in zoos. There's a single Red hartebeest left in Europe at Wroclaw zoo (after decades of successful breeding of the species at Hannover Zoo), and I think the situation for most other Alcelaphinae in US zoos isn't any better.
In general, most modern zoo collections are no longer interested in presenting a large diversity of ungulate species, may it be antelopes, deer or wild sheep/goats; for modern visitors, they're just "landscape accessories" to the big cats/elephants/great apes.
And with the different species of Alcelaphinae, including the Hirola, as potential carriers of Alcelaphine herpesvirus 2 and thus malignant catarrhal fever, chances are slim that European and American zoos will undertake the effort, red tape and risk to re-establish "inconvenient" antelope species in their collections that most visitors are not interested in.