Germany Part Five - Duis like they do on the Discovery Channel
(That pun only works if you pronounce Duisburg wrong, but I bet all the English speakers do)
Sock of the day: Penguin
I spent my rest day in the pleasant city of Dusseldorf. Unfortunately what could have been a nice lie-in was cut extremely short, at FIVE a.m., by the tectonic judderings of the inhabitant of the bunk next to mine. I don't think I've ever heard more violent sounds coming from the mouth of a human being. The same thing happened this morning, so I'm pretty knackered. Now snoring is not always something we can control, but when you've filled your bed with your valuables so you can't roll over I don't think a jury is going to look the other way. It's the first time in a hostel that I've really wished I had earplugs.
Another little thing that is starting to grate is the prevalence of smoking here. It's not at all uncommon in zoos and it's also allowed on train platforms. Not a big fan.
Things I am enjoying one week in are the bakeries and the goods therein, the hostel atmosphere (although I prefer the prices in Asia!), and the general ease of traveling on the interrail card.
I woke this morning in dismay because, as the French say, it really was raining ropes. I nipped out of the hostel before breakfast and bought a role of plastic bags, in order to fashion a waterproof covering for my rucksack. I'm traveling extremely light on this trip, and I've managed to condense everything I'll need for a month into my day bag. This does mean that some items that I would normally pack have been left out, and that cause a bit of bother today. Of course, no sooner had I bought the bags and labouriously threaded the straps of my rucksack through them than the rain stopped and the sun came out.
Duisburg Zoo, July 20th
I have got to that point in the trip where I've seen a lot of similar exhibits, and so I'm tending to breeze past quite a few of them, especially the more traditional paddocks for hoofstock. It's important to remember this when forming an opinion of a zoo, but it certainly keeps the overall visit time down, which is useful when you are tired and wanting to avoid burnout. This was my fifth zoo for the trip, and I'm still having fun and still enjoying the zoos, which is great.
Bearing in mind the above, much of Duisburg is unremarkable and therefore I shan't be remarking on it. There's a reasonably complete selection of ABC mammals, a few reptiles and a decent little aquarium. There WAS a rather large looking Fasanerie, but it has been partly demolished to make way for a new walkthrough bird exhibit. It seems the old indoor holding will be incorporated, as it is still standing. I have a suspicion that the birds are still in there, as the lights were on and I can think of no other good reason. As it was the onshow avian collection was very limited indeed.
Noteworthy things:
The Elephant House is showing its age, and is small inside and out. It is not in the same class as any I have mentioned in this thread.
The Carnivore House, and associated satellite exhibits, is rather good. The house itself holds Lion, Fishing cat and Dwarf mongoose. To the south are a trio of cages for Fossa (which I actually saw!). To the east are at least two enclosures for Clouded leopard, but perhaps more offshow. On the west side are European wildcat and Lynx, with a brace of exhibits a piece. That's a pretty good showing, in pretty good exhibits.
Next to the clouded leopards is a very nice exhibit for two Spectacled bears. They were very showy, with one seemingly have a prelediction for climbing, as it was often up on the logs when I passed by. Vision and I were talking about bears, and how when a zoo builds a new exhibit (possibly on the site of several old grottos) they seem to often go for the Andean bear I have nothing against them of course, but variety is the spice of life and as long as multiple species can be maintained in Europe I'd like to see that happen.
The Common seals' pool is very small indeed, and there are five of them. Probably time to move on from the species.
The new Tasmanian devil exhibits are very pretty, and both devils were out and about. Duisburg's australian collection is very impressive, with eight Koalas, Common wombats, Goodfellow's tree kangaroo, Short-beaked echidna, Brush-tailed kangaroo, emu and even the extremely rare Bennett's wallaby! Wombats were unseen but I did see a lot of wombats sized holes in the ground.
The zoo is split into two halves by a motorway. Impressively, a wide bridge links the two sides and a garden has been built on it. Were it not for the loud noise of the traffic you wouldn't even realise the road was there.
Duisburg's logo features a leaping bottlenose dolphin, and although that may not be the cetecean that springs to mind for ZooChatters, I imagine it is what Duisburg is famous for regionally. The Delfinarium is a huge building with an arena inside. The main pool is not objectively small, but I don't think you could call it large either, especially for the nine(?) individuals they have. Two small pools at the back can be isolated, and a channel leads out of sight to what I presume is a small offshow pool. There isn't space in the building for a large one. I hadn't particularly planned to watch the show, but the timings worked out and I was somewhat intrigued. It made me think about the debate
here on zoo animals performing. The tricks they were showing weren't remotely naturalistic, and it was very much a show geared to children. I'm not convinced there's a great message being sent, although admittedly I didn't follow what was said in any kind of detail. My real take-away was that now I'd like to see Nuremburg's dolphin exhibit, or indeed any that attempts to create a more complex environment.
South of the Delfinarium is a replica Chinese Garden. This was nice, but surely the zoo could find a better use for this space? For example...
Getting some of the monkeys out of the misleadingly named Aquatorium. This is an old primate house with very little having been done to update it. The gorillas have a spacious outdoor exhibit, and indeed a spacious silver back with a spacious family to fill it, but the indoors is distinctly unspacious. 'Cramped', as my calf would put it. The orangs are worse off, like Dudley but without the moat (although grass is nice). Most of the other stuff in there, including some nice things like Roloway monkey, White-naped mangabey, Greater white-nosed guenon and Western black and white colobus, has either no outdoors at all or a simple, small cage that looks straight out of the '70s. For the gibbons in particular it's pretty bad. Downsizing the collection would be a start and I'm not sure why this hasn't already happened. In the long-term almost everything would be better off with a new exhibit. In some ways this would be a shame as the house does have a lot of character. If they built a series of treetop trails they could spread the exhibits out and also rotate them around a bit. They'd still have to sort out the great ape indoors, but it would be one way forward.
If it wasn't for the Boto at Duisburg it is very likely that I'd be bumbling around the Netherlands right now. As I've mentioned before, in general new species are nice but if they are similar to something I've already seen I don't really get to excited. For example, Roloway monkeys were a lifer today but they're so similar to Dianas. However, when a new thing really is new, alien even, that can be a real thrill. When you know that the new thing is the last of its kind in Europe and this will likely be the only time you ever see one the encounter takes on even more poignancy.
So it was with the river dolphin. I spent months dreading the news that it had died just before I got there, and even today I approached the Amazon House (Rio Negra) with a kind of pit in my stomach. I needn't have worried. As long as I passed through the door there he was, twirling bizarrely in the water. This went on for a good minute and I almost decided it was some strange stereotypy, until he stopped and never did it again. He then proceeded to do laps of the pool, which is on several levels, with undergrowth hanging into it and submerged logs and such as well. It's very attractive. Botos are fascinating looking creatures, but you'd struggle to call them pretty. I was completely absorbed for quite some time. He's very old now,has lost most of his teeth, and has a few almighty scars on his tail, which I can only assume came from his disceased tank mates? Nevertheless he is very active and seemed quite curious about the visitors at times. The rest of Rio Negra is actually good as well, with a free-flying Channel-billed toucan, free roaming Red-handed tamarin (and allegedly Sloth and Tamandua), another tank for catfish and enclosures for Lowland paca (unseen) and Greater guinea pig. Wonderful building.
I returned twice over the course of my visit, and on both of the other occasions I was lucky to see him catching live fish, which I can only assume are put in throughout the day. I was surprised by this, but it was incredible to watch. He doesn't seem to be able to sense them from far away but once within a foot it was incredible how agile and fast he was, following every turn and shimmy. His preferred method of the kill was to chew and shock, then release, and which point the fish would swim slowly away and he'd follow. Surprisingly, if the fish made it to the safety of some debris he lost interest almost instantly. Then when he encountered the fish it would put up basically no right and it was game over. If you'd asked me this morning if I was in favour of live feeding I'd have said no, but this was pretty thought provoking. All in all I spent at least a quarter of my time at Duisburg watching him, and it really was an absolute privilege. One of my all-time favourite zoo experiences.
In summary, I'm not really sure Duisburg is all that much. The impressive primate collection is offset by the crappy holding. The cat collection is a serious plus point, as is the Australian fauna. The lack of birds and the generally par to sub-par exhibitry serious minuses. If you rarely visit zoos then you'd probably have a good day out, although why are you reading this? For a zoo enthusiast however, most of what you'll see will probably not impress you much (it's barely got the moves or the touch). This is definitely a zoo to visit for the rarities. But you have to visit! Go and book a flight now and see the boto before it's too late. You can get dirt-cheap flights to Dusseldorf and twin it with Köln Zoo for a great weekend. Or indeed any of the other zoos I've written about so far (though really it should be Köln, or Wuppertal at a push). Do it. (Personal circumstances permitting).
Non-Duisburg thoughts
A seed was planted in my brain after Dortmund. It ripened in Dusseldorf and now it's harvest-time. As previously stated I enjoyed it, but I really didn't feel it was a major zoo and it just felt out of place on my itinerary. It was by no means an Usti moment, but I felt like the advice I would give to myself would be to be a bit more discerning with my zoo list. Also, having paid for a travel pass that covered the whole of Germany I felt that I really could have done something more akin to a grand tour, rather than focusing on a comprehensive Ruhr experience. I was phrasing all of this as advice for the thread, when I suddenly realised the was no reason why I couldn't act on it myself in the present. I actually had no accommodation booked in Munster, my next stop, as there're no hostels there on booking.com. so that made things easier, and I can actually cancel my reservation in Hanover at no cost until the day itself. I probably won't do that though.
The plan was to visit Krefeld before Duisburg today, then two days in Munster with a day at Munster Zoo, before spending a half-day at Rheine on the way to Hanover. That's three zoos that the Comte de Frou Frou would describe as 'small potatoes'. Instead I could go to Duisburg first, giving me the late afternoon to travel to anywhere I wanted in Germany.
So I'm in Berlin.
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