San Diego Zoo Safari Park San Diego Zoo Safari Park News 2024

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Kudu21 said:
Anyways :p According to the photography Facebook group, a roan antelope calf has been born and can be seen with the herd in the East Africa field exhibit! The breeding bull has been pulled from the herd, and he can now be seen in the Grevy’s zebra/bachelor hoofstock exhibit above the Africa Tram pathway.
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The Park has shared an up-close video of the roan antelope calf, and from the positioning of the tag (right ear), it appears the calf is a male.

A male addra gazelle calf is being hand-raised and can be seen in the Nursery Kraal in Nairobi Village.

In very exciting news, there are two Nilgiri tahr kids out with the herd in the Asian Plains field exhibit!
 
"Edward", one of the three male southern white rhinoceroses in the South Africa field exhibit, has been moved to an undisclosed facility.

A new male eastern white-bearded wildebeest has been introduced to the East Africa field exhibit for breeding.

The Petting Kraal is down to three elderly animals -- two Jacob's sheep and one pygmy goat. Once these remaining animals pass, this space will be repurposed into a new exhibit for wild animals.
 
Kudu21 said:
The Park has shared an up-close video of the roan antelope calf, and from the positioning of the tag (right ear), it appears the calf is a male.
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Is right means male/left means female a fairly universal distinction of sex amongst zoos? I've heard of that distinction before in flamingo flocks (and presumably some other birds too), so it's curious that the same left vs. right identification used is in ungulates too.
 
Neil chace said:
Is right means male/left means female a fairly universal distinction of sex amongst zoos? I've heard of that distinction before in flamingo flocks (and presumably some other birds too), so it's curious that the same left vs. right identification used is in ungulates too.
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Yes, it is. The Right = Male, Left = Female system is pretty much ubiquitous across taxa (birds, ungulates, macropods, etc.) and facilities when they are receiving some sort of physical identifier, bands, tags, etc., which is very nice for how often animals move between institutions. Every once in awhile you will see a different method to denote sex, but that is pretty rare. It is also a fairly common method in livestock as well, which is where the practice originated (but there can be a little more variance there). Then the colors and numbers can further indicate other important information about the animal, e.g. year of birth, whatever number offspring that year that particular animal is, etc. There are, however, other physical identifiers that do not indicate sex with a left or right placement, such as ear notchings, where notches in the left versus the right ear denote numbers in either the tens place (left) or ones place (right), instead of sex. Scute notching and freeze brands also do not always indicate sex with their placement
 
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Some good news and some bad news from the Park today:

Good news! A new breeding bull has been introduced to the gemsbok herd in the South Africa field exhibit. The two castrated males from that herd have been moved to the Grevy’s zebra/bachelor Bovid exhibit.

Bad news :( It appears as though one of the last remaining Barbary deer has passed, leaving just two females left.
 
Nile Hippo Expert said:
Very sad news, the park's 52-year-old Silverback male Western Lowland Gorilla Winston has passed away of age-related health issues. :(
San Diego Zoo Safari Park
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Tragic news to hear, he certainly was such a long lived icon of the Safari park.

The plan is to move Paul Donn and Jessica across from the Zoo, so we can expect this to occur soon following Winston's passing.
 
Some updates from the Park from yesterday!

-Gorilla Trail is now reopen for the first time since the passing of silverback "Winston".

-The Matschie's tree kangaroo pair are now being regularly introduced to each other for breeding.

-There are now at least two lesser flamingo hatchlings in nests in the lagoon at the front of the Park, where the Chilean flamingos used to be.

-A blue-billed curassow chick is being raised by the pair of Malayan great argus in one of the aviaries next to the gibbons after its own parents failed to care for it and after the argus pair failed to produce a fertile clutch.

-The hoofstock baby boom throughout the Park continues! There is now a total of eight impala, four Thomson's gazelle, four Cape buffalo, and two roan antelope calves and two Nilgiri tahr kids in the fields, as well as the three Peninsular pronghorn calves, three desert bighorn sheep lambs, one okapi calf, and one southern pudu fawn elsewhere in the Park. There is also at least one addra gazelle (the one being hand-raised in the nursery), but this herd is kept behind-the-scenes, so there might be more!

-With that... There is now a third greater one-horned rhinoceros calf! This calf is another male and was born to sire "Capone"/"Maza" and dam "Anandi".
 
Kudu21 said:
Some updates from the Park from yesterday!

-Gorilla Trail is now reopen for the first time since the passing of silverback "Winston".

-The Matschie's tree kangaroo pair are now being regularly introduced to each other for breeding.

-There are now at least two lesser flamingo hatchlings in nests in the lagoon at the front of the Park, where the Chilean flamingos used to be.

-A blue-billed curassow chick is being raised by the pair of Malayan great argus in one of the aviaries next to the gibbons after its own parents failed to care for it and after the argus pair failed to produce a fertile clutch.

-The hoofstock baby boom throughout the Park continues! There is now a total of eight impala, four Thomson's gazelle, four Cape buffalo, and two roan antelope calves and two Nilgiri tahr kids in the fields, as well as the three Peninsular pronghorn calves, three desert bighorn sheep lambs, one okapi calf, and one southern pudu fawn elsewhere in the Park. There is also at least one addra gazelle (the one being hand-raised in the nursery), but this herd is kept behind-the-scenes, so there might be more!

-With that... There is now a third greater one-horned rhinoceros calf! This calf is another male and was born to sire "Capone"/"Maza" and dam "Anandi".
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Wow truly a massive baby boom for the park! I hope one day we get to see the Addra gazelle back at African Woods :D

Have there been any updates for the habitat of spider monkeys held BTS at the park?
 
Julio C Castro said:
Wow truly a massive baby boom for the park! I hope one day we get to see the Addra gazelle back at African Woods :D

Have there been any updates for the habitat of spider monkeys held BTS at the park?
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Addra gazelles are great and all, but I'll take having the Soemmerring's gazelle herd on exhibit over the Addras any day :p From what I understand, the Addras are being maintained behind-the-scenes, as it is the goal to eventually send offspring from the herd to in-situ breeding facilities/for eventual re-release projects.

I have not heard anything more about any plans to exhibit the spider monkeys. They were originally supposed to go on exhibit in Nairobi Village while they were still very small. They were supposed to be a part of a bigger educational exhibit on the Park's involvement with anti-animal trafficking projects, but that seems to have fallen through and they are too big for that space now. I have wondered if they would consider moving them down to the Zoo to fill the empty lion-tailed macaque exhibit.
 
Kudu21 said:
Addra gazelles are great and all, but I'll take having the Soemmerring's gazelle herd on exhibit over the Addras any day :p From what I understand, the Addras are being maintained behind-the-scenes, as it is the goal to eventually send offspring from the herd to in-situ breeding facilities/for eventual re-release projects.

I have not heard anything more about any plans to exhibit the spider monkeys. They were originally supposed to go on exhibit in Nairobi Village while they were still very small. They were supposed to be a part of a bigger educational exhibit on the Park's involvement with anti-animal trafficking projects, but that seems to have fallen through and they are too big for that space now. I have wondered if they would consider moving them down to the Zoo to fill the empty lion-tailed macaque exhibit.
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Haha I don’t blame you, I’m partial to them as well :p That’s amazing news to hear about the program!

Makes perfect sense if they do that, especially with renovations I’ve seen done at Monkey Trail when I was there months ago and now they may have home there just as you said.
 
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San Diego are hoping to transfer female African Elephant 'Shaba' across to the Safari Park. Her fecal matter is currently being sent over as a form of introduction.

I'd imagine the intention may be to move her over sometime next year (upon the opening of the new habitat), assuming all goes well. This move will allow San Diego to fully focus on being a bachelor facility for this species and also give Shaba companionship in her twilight years.
 
Jambo said:
San Diego are hoping to transfer female African Elephant 'Shaba' across to the Safari Park. Her fecal matter is currently being sent over as a form of introduction.

I'd imagine the intention may be to move her over sometime next year (upon the opening of the new habitat), assuming all goes well. This move will allow San Diego to fully focus on being a bachelor facility for this species and also give Shaba companionship in her twilight years.
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Forgot to include the source - a recent youtube video by RJB Wildlife;
 
OMG I’m subscribed I love your videos.im planning to visit in October so your recent videos are really a great help because it is my first time since 2021 visiting and also could you please if you can make a video about the new expansion for the San Diego.Thx for reading this.
 
Kudu21 said:
Addra gazelles are great and all, but I'll take having the Soemmerring's gazelle herd on exhibit over the Addras any day :p From what I understand, the Addras are being maintained behind-the-scenes, as it is the goal to eventually send offspring from the herd to in-situ breeding facilities/for eventual re-release projects.

I have not heard anything more about any plans to exhibit the spider monkeys. They were originally supposed to go on exhibit in Nairobi Village while they were still very small. They were supposed to be a part of a bigger educational exhibit on the Park's involvement with anti-animal trafficking projects, but that seems to have fallen through and they are too big for that space now. I have wondered if they would consider moving them down to the Zoo to fill the empty lion-tailed macaque exhibit.
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Also much in favour of the Soemmerring's gazelle of the Nubian subspecies, which are increasingly becoming very rare in the US.
 
X213G said:
OMG I’m subscribed I love your videos.im planning to visit in October so your recent videos are really a great help because it is my first time since 2021 visiting and also could you please if you can make a video about the new expansion for the San Diego.Thx for reading this.
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Thank you! I have playlists for both Elephant Valley and Panda Ridge on the channel at the moment. Any future projects will be addressed when more concrete details and active work zones pop up.
 
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