ZSL London Zoo North Mammal House
- Thread starter oldrover
- Start date
Guiler didn't record any purchases/arrivals at Hobart Zoo after 1925. He thought there was a death in 1935 and then the last one in 1936, both from the Mullins litter (mother and three) which arrived in 1924.
Guiler's records, at least of the Zoo Thylacines, do appear both innacurate and incomplete, in that more modern evidence seems to show there was no Thylacine in the Zoo in 1933(or at least part of it) before the last one arrived and which was then the only one until its death.
As you point out, Guiler’s list of zoo thylacines was certainly incomplete. He omitted three of the London Zoo thylacines including the first two (which is very surprising as they had been extremely well documented elsewhere). He also ignored the two Paris thylacines and did not provide dates for the Antwerp or Cologne specimens.
Nevertheless, Guiler deserves credit for attempting to produce a comprehensive list of zoo thylacines; I suppose it was inevitable that further details would be subsequently discovered and his list provided a good starting point for subsequent work.
As I’ve mentioned in another thylacine thread, the best list of zoo thylacines that I know is the one featured in the German book “Der Beutelwolf” (Heinz F. Moeller; 1997).This publication is recommended to everybody interested in thylacines- even if they cannot read German.
I realise that this is an old thread but I found an image of a couple of Cheetahs in what is apparently the North Mammal House, wasn't sure if there were any other photos of it. Stock Photo - Speed champions of the jungle. Two beautifully spotted cheaters settled down in their winter quarters in the North Mammal House at the London Zoo. These cheaters are natives of
Also just found this website which has a lot of old images / illustrations from London Zoo from 1822 to 1905. http://www.avictorian.com/zoological_society.html
Thanks for posting the link to this photo. This picture is especially interesting as the interior of the North Mammal House was not opened to the public; the animals could only be seen when in their outdoor cages.
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Thanks for posting this too; there are some very interesting pictures here.
I particularly like the picture of the old Ape House which was built in 1902 and stood roughly where the current Reptile House now stands. I remember being taken "behind the scenes" in the Reptile House in the 1980s and it was still possible to see the white tiled walls that once formed part of the ape cages.
I think, perhaps, this link to such an interesting website deserves it's own thread.
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Thanks for the feedback. I find all this stuff very interesting too.
I went behind the scenes there last year - were the ape cage walls inside the central section of the house where the venomous snakes are kept (I do remember seeing white tiled walls in this part) or would have they been replaced by then?
No the white-tiled walls I'm referring to were not in the central section of the Reptile House but at the far end of the building.
I first saw the white-tiled walls of the old ape cages in the early 1980s and, then again, several times subsequently. However it is many years since I last saw them and I'm not sure if they're still there. I hope they have been preserved though.
Do they still do behind the scene tours there then?
Thanks, Tim. I don’t remember seeing any tiles at the far end of the house, but will check my photos. Certainly, the ape cages weren’t mentioned by my (highly knowledgable) guide.
Not in the sense that they can be booked. I was chatting to a senior keeper who very kindly offered me the opportunity to arrange a tour with him.
Not in the sense that they can be booked. I was chatting to a senior keeper who very kindly offered me the opportunity to arrange a tour with him.
Sorry, I should have written "at the far end of the building and downstairs". Quite possibly your guide didn't take you downstairs as there is little to see unless you're especially interested in seeing a white-tiled wall.
That sounds like the thing to do.
You're right - unfortunately I wasn't taken downstairs (though if I'd known about the old ape cages at the time, I would have certainly asked about them). Like you, I do hope they're still there.