Marwell Wildlife My Monthly Updates 2011 #1

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Just received a response to my query on facebook about the gibbons and wildebeest:

Thank you for your feedback, we already have plans to move the Wildebeest to another area in the park and are working on a plan to add ropes and poles for the Gibbons. We appreciate your continued support.
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Make what you will, glad to know it's 'under the radar'.
 
Zambar said:
Just received a response to my query on facebook about the gibbons and wildebeest:



Make what you will, glad to know it's 'under the radar'.
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The best laid plans of mice and men, and all that....

To bang the same drum I've banged before - if this were Colchester, they'd already have built something called Realm of the Wildebeest, covered it in awful fake rock, moved the wildebeest to another area of the zoo, converted the old enclosure into something for mandrills, opened a new wildebeest exhibit... I'm not saying that this is necessarily better, but it is all too easy to have 'plans', without actually ever doing anything.
 
As has been said before , basically Marwell`s animal collection is under the control of a new zoo director who is developing the park. It will be some time before everything is in place. Some species are being phased out to fit in with the new plans. But their is little point in speculating too much about what may or may not happen in the interim period.
That is about it. A new brush sweeps a different way!
 
sooty mangabey said:
I really wouldn't count on it!

For a decade or more now, Marwell has seemed a rudderless ship, bobbing around on the ocean without any real sense of what it is doing or where it is going. Our successful zoos have - like it or not - a very clear feel for what they are and what they're doing. This is not the case, I feel, with Marwell. The excellent point made by Zambar above, regarding the meerkat enclosure, is wholly germane here. The farcical fannying around with the reptile house and the area around it also speaks of a place over which no-one has any great sense of vision. This half-hearted approach to the wildebeest is more evidence of this.

Despite its many positives - and they do still remain - I don't think Marwell is a very nice place to visit nowadays. I certainly don't recommend it to non-zoo friends when they ask where to go. It's shabby, lacks coherence, and is under-developed. Again, people may not like Colchester, for example, but look at the amount of development which has been undertaken there in the past decade or so - and with a similar visitor number to that which is enjoyed by Marwell.
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Could this be yet another example of a zoo no longer firmly managed by the strong personality of its founder? Your comment about not recommending Marwell to friends at the present time I find interesting, this is exactly what I think about Edinburgh at the present time unfortunately, and is exactly what I posted the other day on the Edinburgh Zoo thread,
 
But gone are the days of zoos being able to pay their keepers next to nothing because, essentially, it was possible to live on next to nothing if you loved your job, whereas nowadays, you can't do that because property everywhere is overpriced, especially rental, and so Marwell has clearly been on a journey of marketability over the last couple of decades, and I don't think it would have survived had it not done this.

I would love there to be a way a park comprised essentially of paddocks and wood/wire enclosures in parkland and woodland housing rare ungulates and carnivores could have survived into the present day, however even Howletts and Port Lympne, funded by the once mighty casinos, have had to 'develop' to attract more gate revenue and additional spend.

Colchester, as an example given by someone else on this thread, was not a particularly attractive site to walk round.....I think development at place like Marwell and Port Lympne always risk detracting from the character of those places, given that so much of it is provided by the trees and topography.

I do think that Marwell needed its penguins, it needed its tropical house, but it had the perfect natural woodland for an open-topped gibbon/anoa/otter exhibit, which could have been constructed at less cost, and I hope over time Marwell will open up and combine its paddock system (now that the African Valley is open), move its primates into the woods, and not attempt to convert an open field into an expensive gorilla exhibit. But we shall see...
 
TARZAN said:
Could this be yet another example of a zoo no longer firmly managed by the strong personality of its founder? Your comment about not recommending Marwell to friends at the present time I find interesting, this is exactly what I think about Edinburgh at the present time unfortunately, and is exactly what I posted the other day on the Edinburgh Zoo thread,
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You are , unfortunately, spot on!
 
johnstoni. said:
But gone are the days of zoos being able to pay their keepers next to nothing because, essentially, it was possible to live on next to nothing if you loved your job, whereas nowadays, you can't do that because property everywhere is overpriced, especially rental, and so Marwell has clearly been on a journey of marketability over the last couple of decades, and I don't think it would have survived had it not done this.

I would love there to be a way a park comprised essentially of paddocks and wood/wire enclosures in parkland and woodland housing rare ungulates and carnivores could have survived into the present day, however even Howletts and Port Lympne, funded by the once mighty casinos, have had to 'develop' to attract more gate revenue and additional spend.

Colchester, as an example given by someone else on this thread, was not a particularly attractive site to walk round.....I think development at place like Marwell and Port Lympne always risk detracting from the character of those places, given that so much of it is provided by the trees and topography.

I do think that Marwell needed its penguins, it needed its tropical house, but it had the perfect natural woodland for an open-topped gibbon/anoa/otter exhibit, which could have been constructed at less cost, and I hope over time Marwell will open up and combine its paddock system (now that the African Valley is open), move its primates into the woods, and not attempt to convert an open field into an expensive gorilla exhibit. But we shall see...
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Your first paragraph is absolutely spot on with regards to keepers!
 
Zambar said:
Just received a response to my query on facebook about the gibbons and wildebeest:



Make what you will, glad to know it's 'under the radar'.
Click to expand...

So will the Wildebeest be moving to another area of the Park temporarily and then leaving Marwell later? Seems better if they were just rehomed in one go, if they are leaving.

How long does it take to 'plan' ropes and poles in a Siamang exhibit?:confused: This enclosure has been up for several years now. I suspect as Johnstoni said, they didn't want to alter the appearance with extra equipment. Perhaps a few adverse comments here have helped on that.
 
Pertinax said:
So will the Wildebeest be moving to another area of the Park temporarily and then leaving Marwell later? Seems better if they were just rehomed in one go, if they are leaving.

How long does it take to 'plan' ropes and poles in a Siamang exhibit?:confused: This enclosure has been up for several years now. I suspect as Johnstoni said, they didn't want to alter the appearance with extra equipment. Perhaps a few adverse comments here have helped on that.
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The Wildebeest are on the list to go at some point. They may or may not move elsewhere beforehand but it is unlikely.

The Siamangs lack of facilities is well documented, some efforts have been made to recitfy this but it still falls short of what is really needed and probably always will do as the design of the enclosure in terms of structure does not lend itself to much improvement in this direction unfortunately.
 
Well I hope they consider eventually moving the macaques into the siamang exhibit and giving the gibbons a clump of live, mature, trees to live in in the way that Monkey World has done so well:


Wait until 00:30, then you really see how siamang should be exhibited....Life in the Trees indeed...
 
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Nanook said:
The Wildebeest are on the list to go at some point. They may or may not move elsewhere beforehand but it is unlikely.

The Siamangs lack of facilities is well documented, some efforts have been made to recitfy this but it still falls short of what is really needed and probably always will do as the design of the enclosure in terms of structure does not lend itself to much improvement in this direction unfortunately.
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So saying on facebook the Wildebeest will be moving to another area of the park is likely to be just a platitude then?;)

Yes, I can see how the design of the Siamang enclosure doesn't lend itself to a lot more equipment. A pretty stupid design if you ask me, it looks very 'fancy' and attractive but not fit for its purpose. A strange thing for a place like Marwell to do?
 
Pertinax said:
So saying on facebook the Wildebeest will be moving to another area of the park is likely to be just a platitude then?;)

Yes, I can see how the design of the Siamang enclosure doesn't lend itself to a lot more equipment. A pretty stupid design if you ask me, it looks very 'fancy' and attractive but not fit for its purpose. A strange thing for a place like Marwell to do?
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It could be. (PM me about it if you like?)
Yes, is the short answer.
 
A few observations from today's visit to Marwell:

1) Still no sign of the new female giant anteater so I'm not sure if she has arrived yet or not
2) I think it is safe to announce now that Irina the snow leopard gave birth to three healthy cubs on 2nd June - there is a video in the picnic shelter showing the first 6 weeks of their lives in the den; they will not be on public show until the end of August
3) One of the tapirs is under veterinary care
4) The female Somali wild asses are in the old roan antelope enclosure (opposite the Chapman's zebras)
5) The new meerkat enclosure is coming along nicely and there are already at least two meerkats in one of the indoor areas (which probably includes the two new males as there are now three meerkats in the enclosure behind the snow leopards whilst the enclosure behind the Hall is empty for "essential maintenance")
6) I spotted five Scimitar-horned oryx calves
7) Four male Scimitar-horned oryxes have been separated from the herd and are in the area alongside the Grevy's zebra hardstanding
8) The potto enclosure is still empty
9) Some more new signs and banners have gone up around the park

New arrivals (since the information board was last updated) are as follows:

08/06/11 - Female Rothschild's giraffe 'Irsula' from Woburn Safari Park
09/06/11 - 2 male meerkats - 'Kalahari' from West Midlands Safari Park and 'Monty' from Chester Zoo

New births (since the information board was last updated) are as follows:

17/06/11 - 7 Capybara
17/06/11 - Female Gentle Lemur
18/06/11 - 1 Waterbuck
18/06/11 - 1 Grevy's Zebra
21/06/11 - 5 Capybara
23/06/11 - 1 male and 1 female Scimitar-horned Oryx
27/06/11 - 1 Slender-billed Conure
28/06/11 - 1 Slender-billed Conure
 
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There are actually 4 Meerkats in that first part of the new Meerkat enclosure, which is indeed the new males 'Kalahari' from West Midlands SP and 'Monty' from Chester, as well as 'Chico' from Belfast and 'Parsley' born at Marwell (used to be in with the other group). As of this afternoon the other 3 from behind the Snow Leopards are also up at the new enclosure in the 2nd den, all 7 Meerkats are confined to the house at the moment until tomorrow morning when the group of 4 will be let outside.
The Dwarf Mongoose were also put into the enclosure behind Marwell hall this afternoon where the Meerkats were (they've been out of view for last few months).
The enclosure behind the Snow Leopards now says 'Currently empty for essential maintenance'.
The recorded footage of the Snow Leopard cubs being shown in the picnic shelter just past the Pygmy Hippo's is absolutely great, much clearer images than I was expecting to see.
The 5th SH Oryx calf (born this morning I think) was really close to the fence with its mum down in the bottom corner well away from the rest of the herd where the old Serval enclosure used to be behind the Kudu house, really nice to see it so close.
 
Thank you for that extra information - I left the zoo at 2:00 pm so there were obviously quite a few changes later on!! It's a shame I missed the dwarf mongooses going back into their old enclosure.

I agree that the footage of the cubs is superb quality - they are really an energetic trio!

Attached are a couple of photos of the newly-born oryx calf; I was careful not to get too close to the fence as the mother was obviously very protective of her calf.
 

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I really want to ask on their Facebook page when they think the Snow Leopard cubs will be out but they haven't announced the birth yet anywhere, so I feel its best to wait until the official announcement! I'm defintely going around end of August as haven't been for... goodness... two years now? Crikey! Thats bad.
 
Probably be OK to ask as they've got a film of them on public display, so it's all out. But end of August is your best bet anyway. :)
 
When I visited on 8th July, I was told by the Head of Section that the cubs would be out on public display at 12 weeks old - this coincides with the Bank Holiday weekend so that is definitely the time to visit :) After my visit on Monday this week where I saw the video of the cubs, I asked on Facebook if the video would be uploaded at all and Marwell's reply was that it is not going to be uploaded as it is for visitors to Marwell only.
 
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