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Zooish

Zooish

Well-Known Member
20+ year member
Chanced upon this video on youtube, showing the ENTIRE Lion-tailed Macaque troop escaping from their island enclosure in rather spectacular fashion. Looks like the zoo will need to find a new way of housing them! :eek:


All video credits and rights belong to the owner.
 
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@shirokuma: I have no idea if all have been recaptured. For non-dangerous primate escapees, the zoo's usual method is to lay baited traps and wait it out.
 
Hi, this is my first post here, but have been reading for a while now.

May i ask what happened to those African Wild Dogs? Been there two weeks ago, after a long long time away from the zoo. Noticed much change to the zoo also.
 
Hi bench,

The wild dog and meerkat exhibits are closed for upgrading. Both are scheduled to reopen in October. A new naked mole-rat exhibit is also under construction at the former puma exhibit. It should be opening soon too.
 
@Zooish: So that means no more pumas at Singapore Zoo? Did they all die or were they sent to another zoo (and if so, which one)?
Thank you in advance for your answer.
 
@zoomaniac: From what i know, the pumas are being phased out. Just before the exhibit closed, there was still a pair on display, with another pair off-show. The off-show pair are retired show animals, so they'll probably remain until they pass on. I have no idea where the other pair is now, but chances are they will be (or have been) exported. Singapore Zoo doesn't release information about animal movements (only significant ones at least), so its hard to know where the animals go.

btw, the zoo staff are now on strict gag order after a new management took over and created a huge public relations disaster. They're rather apprehensive about sharing "insider" info now.
 
Zooish said:
Hi bench,

The wild dog and meerkat exhibits are closed for upgrading. Both are scheduled to reopen in October. A new naked mole-rat exhibit is also under construction at the former puma exhibit. It should be opening soon too.
Click to expand...

Where do the zoo house animals whose exhibits are under construction? Do animals who are off-exhibit, enjoy similar enclosures that are as big as on-show exhibit?
 
I read that Singapur Zoo is keeping 2 female indian sloth bears and received two further females from Frankfurt in 2010 (both born at Leipzig Zoo in 1997 and 2000).

Is there any information how old the two females are and where they came from?
 
bench said:
Where do the zoo house animals whose exhibits are under construction? Do animals who are off-exhibit, enjoy similar enclosures that are as big as on-show exhibit?
Click to expand...

It depends. If parts of the existing enclosure (for example, the off-exhibit dens) are not affected by construction, the animals simply remain there. Otherwise, they may be moved to temporary enclosures at another location.

The off-exhibit enclosures are generally smaller than the display enclosures, and are "no-frills" - meaning that they don't have nice landscaping/design. But the off-show enclosures offer the animals privacy and meet their basic needs, such as climbing structures for tree-dwelling animals or a pool for animals that swim.
 
BjoernN said:
I read that Singapur Zoo is keeping 2 female indian sloth bears and received two further females from Frankfurt in 2010 (both born at Leipzig Zoo in 1997 and 2000).

Is there any information how old the two females are and where they came from?
Click to expand...

The 2 existing bears are a mother and daughter pair. The daughter was born in Singapore (around the late 90s or early 2000s i think). Unfortunately I don't have info about the origins of the mother.
 
Thank you, Zooish...

The daughter could be invaluable to replenish the european zoo population.
 
Zooish said:
It depends. If parts of the existing enclosure (for example, the off-exhibit dens) are not affected by construction, the animals simply remain there. Otherwise, they may be moved to temporary enclosures at another location.

The off-exhibit enclosures are generally smaller than the display enclosures, and are "no-frills" - meaning that they don't have nice landscaping/design. But the off-show enclosures offer the animals privacy and meet their basic needs, such as climbing structures for tree-dwelling animals or a pool for animals that swim.
Click to expand...

But for some animals, their existing enclosure are already quite small, wouldn't their off exhibit enclosure to meet their meets, especially if the renovating of their existing enclosure takes a few months? For example, the leopard had their enclosure revamped few months or years ago? Did the zoo provide a temp enclosure both safe for the keepers and healthy enough for the animals?

And by the way, the zoo's gold lion tamarin enclosure, near fragile forest, looks in quite a lousy state. Personally think the animals are afraid. I think they were on free ranging once before? It looked so much better for them then.
 
bench said:
But for some animals, their existing enclosure are already quite small, wouldn't their off exhibit enclosure to meet their meets, especially if the renovating of their existing enclosure takes a few months? For example, the leopard had their enclosure revamped few months or years ago? Did the zoo provide a temp enclosure both safe for the keepers and healthy enough for the animals?

And by the way, the zoo's gold lion tamarin enclosure, near fragile forest, looks in quite a lousy state. Personally think the animals are afraid. I think they were on free ranging once before? It looked so much better for them then.
Click to expand...

Before I go on, I must make it clear that i do not represent Wildlife Reserves Singapore. I'm just a regular visitor who happens to know a bit more about how the zoo works.

I think you meant the cheetahs. Yes, i agree that keeping animals in off-exhibit enclosures for long periods is not ideal. But the alternative of moving them is costly and may not necessarily be in the best interest of the animals. Moving an animal usually causes them a high level of stress, and if sedation is used, there's a very real risk of losing the animals (calculating the precise amount of sedative to use on animals is very challenging). The cheetahs were kept in their off-exhibit yard during the renovation of their enclosure due to (a) their fragile nature, which makes moving them risky; (b) the lack of an alternative enclosure that is suitable to house them temporarily; and (c) their off-exhibit yard was not affected by the renovation.

The Golden-headed Lion Tamarin enclosure is actually only a couple of years old, but was originally built to house smaller marmosets. Free-ranging is good for both animals and visitors, but entails risks such as theft, visitors hurting/feeding the animals and predation from wild pythons/monitor lizards. Many years ago, a visitor was caught trying to burn the tail of a free-ranging tamarin with a lighter. And I've lost count of the number of times I've chided other visitors for feeding the free-ranging primates with chips and snacks. I'm curious to know what made you think the lion tamarins were afraid.
 
Any update of the wild dog area being finished?

Incidentally: there has been another litter of Asiatic lion cubs. :D
 
Kifaru Bwana said:
Any update of the wild dog area being finished?

Incidentally: there has been another litter of Asiatic lion cubs. :D
Click to expand...

Its done, but they only did slope stabilization works (the enclosure is built on a rather steep incline) rather than a makeover, so it looks pretty much the same as before. What I mistakenly thought would be an extension of the wild dog exhibit turned out to be a new warthog enclosure. Welcome news nonetheless as its bigger than the old one. The rebuilt meerkat enclosure (next to the warthogs, Lion King reference obviously) is also bigger than the old one. Pics to come when I visit early next year.

The male lion Kapat from India is rather virile :D
 
Zooish said:
Chanced upon this video on youtube, showing the ENTIRE Lion-tailed Macaque troop escaping from their island enclosure in rather spectacular fashion. Looks like the zoo will need to find a new way of housing them! :eek:

Ape Escape - YouTube

All video credits and rights belong to the owner.
Click to expand...

The macaques have been recaptured and returned to the same enclosure. Additional hot wire has been added around the moat, along the moat edge and on trees near the moat to discourage another escape.
 
some important staff changes at the zoo, but management are quick to assure that it will not affect the arrival of the giant pandas to Singapore:
Singapore Zoo's GM quits after 18 years of service
22 January 2012

The Singapore Zoo has lost one of the key personnel who was involved in bringing in the giant pandas to Singapore, reported The Sunday Times.

Zoologist Biswajit Guha, Singapore Zoo's general manger (GM), has quit after an 18-year long tenure.

The Wildlife Reserves Singapore (WRS), which runs the Singapore Zoo, Night Safari and Jurong Bird Park, also confirmed the departure of Ms Pauline Chua, WRS' director of human resource.

She had left in August and is now the general manager of human organisation resources and development at Fuji Xerox Singapore.

Ms Sofiah Koh, formerly from Frasers Centrepoint is now the new human resource director at WRS.

Meanwhile, Mr Desmond Koh, GM of the Night Safari, will serve as the interim GM for the zoo.

The Sunday Times also reported that Mr Guha declined to be interviewed or reveal what his future plans are.

Ms Isabel Cheng, WRS' director for marketing and communication, told The Sunday Times that the plans for the pandas' arrival have not been affected by Mr Guha's departure and that they will arrive according to schedule in March.
Click to expand...
 
Chlidonias said:
some important staff changes at the zoo, but management are quick to assure that it will not affect the arrival of the giant pandas to Singapore:
Singapore Zoo's GM quits after 18 years of service
Click to expand...

Biswajit's departure is a big loss for the zoo. His background in Zoology and the fact that he worked his way up from a keeper gave him a lot of experience. He was part of the team that built up the zoo's invertebrate collection from scratch in the 90s (which culminated in the opening of the much-loved Fragile Forest exhibit in 1998).
 
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