Chester Zoo New species at Chester

Writhedhornbill

Writhedhornbill

Well-Known Member
These are some of the new species At chester zoo within the past 9 months

1 male Indian rhino from berlin
1 male baby Asian elephant
1 male baby tapir
4 male Livingstone's fruit bats from Jersey zoo
1 male,1 female mangrove snake
2 males, 2female white lipped viper
1 male reticulated python
2 male, 2 female visayan warty pigs from rotterdam ( when you next go look out for these they are brilliant to watch)
2 baby Javan rhinoceros hornbills
1 male warthog ( it joins the female, who has been alone for a while after her mate escaped and got trampled by a rhino)
1 male Babirusa ( the last male died at the age of 16 last August)
1 female Okapi
2 male rhinoceros vipers from Houston zoo in Texas
40 african dormice
2 male giant forest pouched rats
About 3 baby red river hogs ( they breed regularly)
1 male,1 female black lion tamarin
1 female baby rothschild's giraffe
1 female spectacled bear
2 males,1 female salvadori's pheasant
Some addax are due to arrive soon as are some sumartran tigers
2 baby jaguars have just been born
 
WOW thats a nice list of animals there, errr we will take the babys Jags, hehe
 
That's a very interesting list Mr Hornbill. I look on Chester's website often but they only announce just the odd very important arrival- many of these I knew nothing about.

Jaguars- 1. do you know how many adults Chester have now? I think they had the ones from Marwell including at least one black male..
2 How many are normal. And how many Black?

3. Is Sofia, the new mother, the female which lives in the 'Desert' environment. I think the father is a spotted male- or perhaps not?
 
Well, It will not be annouced on the news yet as they are not sure that the cubs will survive.

They have 3 males and 2 females. One of the largest captive groups of Jaguars. I think the males are all spotted and then the female Sofia ( the one who had cubs) is spotted and the one the Marwell female jaguars is black.
Marwell Gave their Jags to Chester to make way for something else.
Chester did have an eldery pair Carlos( A spotted male) and Ebony ( a Black female) But they died. That was why it was good to fill up the other half of the Enclosure again.Marwell gave Chester a Male and A female and their son, to fill up the rainforest half.
The father of the sofia's cubs is probably Salvador. He is spotted.
 
Yes, I've seen the old pair before they died. The male was very large and had a gammy leg. I think both of them came from Rome Zoo.

Sofia is a nice female. Salvador looks like a different 'race' to her as he seems very small. I wonder if Marwell set theirs to Chester as the enclosure was very outdated- its disappeared entirely now-just a grassy area. You may already know- Jags are VERY dangerous cats- a bit of a liability in zoos as they will attack and always KILL if they get the chance.
 
I was told that When I went behind the Jag house to see the water voles and bird quaritine. And yes. They did come from rome
 
I got told be Steven Mckeowen that they are being kept near the babirusa. I don't think that this is a permenent basis as it has halved the size of the babirusa enclosure. There is the maned wolf enclsoure. The both died last year so they could go there I suppose.......
 
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The Negros Warty Pigs are in the old Babirusa enclosures. The Babirusa have been moved to an area behind the giraffe house but can be viewed from the canal walk. I heard that the old Maned Wolf enclosure will be used for another dog species in the future, but knowing how Chester does things, anything could turn up.
 
Ohh. I love the Babirusa.... Maybe they'll breed now that they're out of the main public eye. I've worked in that enclosure and found it rather small. Didn't it used to house the Arabian Gazelles? I know it has held Dicky the Okapi which has gone to London zoo and a male bongo who has also moved. Maybe They'll still be visible......
 
Writhedhornbill said:
Ohh. I love the Babirusa.... Maybe they'll breed now that they're out of the main public eye...
Click to expand...

That may not be the reason they do not breed. At Twycross the Babirusa are very close to the public but have bred successfully. It may be something to do with one or both of these individual animals....
 
Do twycross still have the Babirusa? They did when I went about 8 years ago. South lakes claimed on it's website that it had also bred them. What other European zoos have bred the species? and why does America have so much more sucess? I know that they have a different subspecies but I don't think that it would make a huge difference.
 
Not sure who has bred babirusa in Europe recently, there are very few breeding females. I would guess the reason for breeding failure is down to inbreeding. If I remember the first collection to have Babirusa in the UK in recent times was Jersey, they were from Rotterdam and Antwerp I think. The European stock has a small founder population. Chester's female is able to breed, let's hope the male is as willing.
 
Elliot, The previous male died last August. Do you know where this new male Came from. Edinburgh? The sad thing about Elliot's death was that the female had just had a baby. It was stillborn, but It gave some hope to the Giraffe keepers. When I worked there for a day nd fed him, he seemed fine. He must have just been very old.
 
I assume the male Babirusa came from the continent. Tim was trying to obtain a male at the EEP meeting in October 2006, and obviously did a deal with someone.
 
They are looking to renevate the buffalo house in th near future. If they did this the Negros island warty pigs would have to move as they would be in the Islands and water zone, rather than the forest zone. The same applies for the babirusa. but not for the red river hogs....
 
I was thinking about this, Jonathan. I had not heard about the buffalo renovation- but I guessed it might be the plan. If you think of the zoo at present, the forest 'zone' area, does seem to be quite well split, with Amazon centred around the jags, SE Asia around the orangs, and Africa around the Okapis. The babirusa were one of the species that were a bit out of place, being South East Asian. Perhaps they're planning a new babirusa area, and using their current enclosure as a temporary home for warty pigs till they get an African species to fill this slot. Maybe even move bongos down there- it'd sort of work.

The Warty Pigs long-term plan might be to create some sort of phillipine centred exhibit. Go nicely alongside Chester's spotted deer? Just speculating out loud- but it would all slot together!

It's very intriguing that you say the Maned Wolves are due to be replaced by another dog species. When I was there it had cranes in, but it did seem very temporary. The only dog I considered were dhole, but I don't think there's the room. Are there any rare species of fox that might be a possibility?
 
What crane species did they have? If it was the white naped then maybe they could have caught a disease from the maned wolves. I could also of course be chesters young black crowned cranes.

Dhole, I think are on the zoo's master plan. The also plan to get geladas, barbary lions and a new aquarium. The new dholes I think are in the forest zone. The giraffes are moving to a new african safari zone. and there will be more okapi in the zoo.

I think the plan with the waries is to put them on a island area. The african pig, could be the red river hogs. But seeing as though they've only just gone in the new enclosure near the tropical realm, maybe they might not. Did they used to have Gemsbok in the cattle house? There is a picture of it on the front door.
 
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