That is what I thought but the ones owned by Apenheul are the first born, second born and fifth born. Btw, these animals are not on loan from Apenheul but rather Taronga actually bought these, rather than being transferred by recommendations. Is there any logic in this?
Lowland gorillas in Europe 2011
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That is what I thought but the ones owned by Apenheul are the first born, second born and fifth born. Btw, these animals are not on loan from Apenheul but rather Taronga actually bought these, rather than being transferred by recommendations. Is there any logic in this?
You would need to see the loan contract between Taronga and Apenheul to know what exactly was agreed on this.
I can see that both Fataki and M'beli are females. In Gorillas, females are more valuable than males, so maybe the contract stated that Apenheul will get the first 2 females. That would not be so unusual, fe I saw similar contract for giraffes (a genetically highly valuable male was loaned to other zoo with the condition first two female youngs will go back to his original zoo).
I doubt that Apenheul sold its gorillas to Taronga, the big zoos in Holland have a politic not to sell animals to other zoos (they can be only donated, loaned or exchanged).
Accually, even if an animal within EEP/SSP is transfered according to a recomendation, it depends on the agreement between the two zoos what type of a transfer it will be, it needn´t be a loan. And on the other side, there are lots of breeding loans that have nothing to do with EEPs or so.
Actually, Fataki is a male. That could be a possibility that they would get the first and second borns. Btw, I'm sorry I have to type a few replies for quotes on your comments but I'm typing from a phone!
Nope, it was a rare exception in that Taronga purchased the group from Apenheul and it was the largest transfer of gorillas in a single exportation. Only one of the females imported is owned by Taronga, the other adults are owned by Apenheul. The point is I see no real pattern or visible theme in their deal with Apenheul as to who owns the females. To me, it is a random decision.
Taronga did purchase the group from Apenheul. But surely that means they are owned by Taronga- why do you say only one of the(original) imported females is owned by Taronga?
I can't help with any more info on how the young have been divided up ownership-wise but Jana's explanation is pretty accurate. However I doubt its 'random' split, even if it seems a bit like that. 'Ownership' is often
a technicality as most of the animals are governed by breeding programmes anyway.
Its worth noting that two females that were born in the group while it was still in Holland (Anguka & Safira) were later removed at maturity at Taronga and sent(via Adelaide) back to Zoos in Europe- so the EEP still has a say in what happens to group members here.
No, if most of the imported animals are still owned by Apenheul, then they are on loan, and NOT purchased (=sold for money).
There must be some given pattern how they share the offspring, there is always some, but we just don´t know how it looks like.
We can only come with a hypothetical scenario, for example - both zoos will share 1/2 of the future youngs, but with the exception that the first 2 female youngsters will go to Apenheul. So:
M´beli - first female = Apenheul
Fataki - second female = Apenheul
Kimya - third youngster = Taronga
Fuzu - fourth youngster = Taronga
At that time each zoo received 50% of the offspring and from that moment they will go in the usual pattern odd younsters are owned by Apenheul and even ones by Taronga, so that:
Mahali - odd = Apenheul
Kipenzi - even = Taronga
If you want to know how it is in reality, you would have to contact the zoo itself I think.
I am getting this information from Gorillas Galore website. Every Aussie zoo is part of the EEP, so they have to send them where they are told to in Europe (and Asia as well). That is why I think it would be a great place to import a US silverback to breed into the European population. It could be a mutual breeding centre between US and EEP gorillas for thevEEP program.
Money(a lot of it) did change hands in this case and the group was 'purchased' (very unusually). However maybe it wasn't straightforward and they were paying for aquisition/movement of the whole group, and for only some of the individual animals. Evidently there were strings attatched as to how future young born at Taronga would be divided up.
I was under the impression ownership of the the whole of the group that went from Apenheul was then transferred to Taronga, but it seems not to be so.
Gorillas Galore must be wrong or inaccurate then and Taronga must own more individuals, because I am certain that they bought the whole secondary troop of gorillas from Apenheul and they arrived on the 7th October 1996. I am not really bothered by how they name the gorillas, it just seems random to me. Thanks anyway for your help.
You are quite correct about how/when they came to Taronga. Gorillas Galore does have a lot of innaccuracies, and I think these 'ownership' listings of this group are an example of that.
I believe the whole group of adults that came from Apenheul is owned by Taronga Park. There may have been a clause in the original contract about sharing the ownership of young born at Taronga though, or those listings may be innaccurate too!
regarding your comment about US males potentially being imported as 'new blood'. The European population could also do with some fresh bloodlines too, as it is getting harder and harder to find completely unrelated males to add to breeding groups. Some genetic lines in Europe are heavily over-represented and most of the unrepresented animals still around are non-breeders for various reasons.
At the time the Kibabu group left Holland this was not owned by the Foundation of Apenheul. The group was owned by a private person, and Apenheul was not involved in the financial aspect of transaction. The foundation Apenheul owned the Bongo group.
The Kibabu group remained under the umbrella op the EEP.
The Kibabu group remained under the umbrella op the EEP.
Thank you for clearing that up. So most probably Kibabu and the original animals are all owned by Taronga and most definately not Apenheul considering they were owned by private hands.
One last question, is Asia part of the EEP?
Yes, I know the EEP needs fresh blood, so I thought Taronga would be one of the facilities to start this, breeding EEP animals with US animals. The offspring could be sent overseas to zoos such as Howlettes, etc. to establish them and breed them further within Europe. Kibabu is a very overrepresented animal both with his offspring and his brother Kifu at Howlettes and between them they have something like 20 or so surviving offspring.
I don`t think that entirely true, since the owner is always the one who has the last say. The EEP coordinator can only make recommendations. In some EEPs, the recommendations are followed, in others, zoos often ignore them. In high-profile species like gorillas and elephants it`s always good (from the zoo`s point of view) to own the animals because it gives you the option to make your own deals. The EEP can`t do anything against it. Usually wishes of the owners are taken into consideration and home-made deals between two zoos (which may or may not include financial compensation) are approved. Otherwise, the zoo can be kicked out of the EAZA, but this only happens very rarely. I guess Dvur Kralove was excluded from the EAZA because they did their own stuff just a bit too often...
Was Kibabu's group owned by Wim Mager privately then?
Yes. there's certainly some truth in what you say here and the EEP 'recommendations' are really only that and not more. They can't force a zoo to move an animal against their will, or even to agree with the recommendation. But I think the EEP do seem to have increasing power in some instances. Even Howlett's/Port Lympne seem to take notice of some of their requests nowadays, and that was unheard of years ago. (But they still do their own thing in other situations).
In the case of the Chessington Gorilla group for example, ownership of the animals is quite complicated I believe, as the contributing founders came from several different ownership sources-Chessington/ London/ Jersey/Howletts and I don't know how that's reflected in the ownership of the six younger animals that have been born there. But I'm pretty sure when EEP asked them to transfer 'Mjuku' to London, Chessington were unwilling to let her go, and so I think the EEP stalled the move of new male 'Damisi' from Paignton until Chessington obliged by transferring Mjuku!
I guess there must be many 'political' moves of this nature.
It would be interesting also to know who actually(despite what GorillasGalore says) owns Mjuku and her baby too.
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Kibabu and (Howletts) Kifu are not brothers. Kibabu is Kisoro x Baby Doll.
Kifu is Kijo x Founa. Kijo was Kisoro x Juju. So Kibabu and Kijo were halfbrothers.
But all these 'K' gorillas are related through the original breeding male Kisoro.
See these days, the years before the Kibabu group moved, the hunger of Sydney of presenting a good city and zoo at the time of the Olympic Games, and the situation of no speaking terms between the chairman of the foundation and the owner of the second gorilla group. The owner needed to live somehow. That's the story. More privately.
More zoo politics!- every time you look deeper into a story something like this emerges...
I think it may be affiliated, but in Gorilla terms that really only involves Japan(and maybe China/Shanghai) as they are only places in Asia with breeders in their zoos.
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