Hey did anyone see that doco in 93/94 about the new Orangutan exhibit being made. Forgot that Crab Eating Macaques once shared the exhibit and how the late Archie kept a weather in the press water tap in the old exhibit so it ran constantly and was nicknamed his fountain by keepers. Also in the doco it shows how what i knew as Mary the Muller Gibbons island was Squirrel Monkey island for a short stage but they kept eating and or damaging the old moreton fig tree so they were removed. Always though Mary had been there for decades due to that story posted in her obituary article about the lightning storm of 1990 knocking her tree down and the poor thing stayed clinging in the tree overnight instead of escaping and obviously very happy to see someone familiar jumped into her keepers arms the next morning. But if her tree was destroyed then she must have been moved elsewhere right. Mary was such a beautiful girl and made touched many hearts over a long time hey. I remember seeing her in about 2009 and this old guy next to me said 'Good old Mary bless her shes a widower, remember her when I was a young fella not much older than you swinging around with her partner.' I imagine if shed been at Taronga since the 60s her and her partners original exhibit would have been more of that era like the great apes and other primates etc had in the day right? Was glad to see Kayak and Nelly last year as remembered them from Perth back in 2006. Had no idea that the male Silvery had died and Regina had gone to Howletts. Would love it if Taronga had space for both Silveries and White Cheeks. To be honest would love it if many other Gibbons had a home there also but thats not realistically feasbile i know. Funny enough my friend didnt want to accept the limiting of species as much as other smaller zoos like perth she said 'but Tarongas pretty big for a city, is it funding cuts or something.' But besides Mary and the other Gibbons i had wondered about that 93/94 Orang exhibit and thought id read somewhere that people were very underwhelmed by it at the time or something like it hadnt been as much as expected or so on? Perth took a long time to improve its Orangs living conditions but its seems to be doing pretty well now (considering natural vegetation and trees arent really possible right as the Orangs uproot, break, destroy quickly right?) and yeah I know Taronga only had what four (now only two) Orangs when that exhibit was made so compared to Perths 10-15 full time resident Orangs (leaving out all the successfully bred ones that have gone on to other zoos or Sumatra 
) i suppose Taronga wasnt aiming for too grandiose an exhibit. But with the sharing of the exhibit were the males and females together sometimes and seperated at others i dont know much about Tarongas daily living routine with their Orangs but remember the other small inside exhibit with jungle gym, boxes, newspapers and thought maybe the males (or at least Jantan) were seperated. Archie did inhabit the big exhibit right on top of the jungle gym under the cable cars with carboard boxes or something.
) i suppose Taronga wasnt aiming for too grandiose an exhibit. But with the sharing of the exhibit were the males and females together sometimes and seperated at others i dont know much about Tarongas daily living routine with their Orangs but remember the other small inside exhibit with jungle gym, boxes, newspapers and thought maybe the males (or at least Jantan) were seperated. Archie did inhabit the big exhibit right on top of the jungle gym under the cable cars with carboard boxes or something.
btw how do you move certain posts to a new thread when they are in need of shifting lol 