Species you'd like to see in the UK?

S

Sand Cat

Well-Known Member
15+ year member
With all this exciting talk of Edinburgh getting Giant Pandas, it set me thinking: what other species that are presently absent from UK collections would you like to see brought over here?

My number one would definitly be pandas, but after them I'd probably say Douc Langurs - stunningly beautiful animals. Any different lemurs would be excellent too, particularly Diademed Sifakas! But I don't see that happening any time soon... mind you, it's not that long since I really wanted a UK collection to get ANY sifakas, so who knows?


Andrew.
 
Sand cat, I would say species such as Douc Langers are far better in tropical zoos like Singapore where they can be housed outside all year round and fed all the tropical browse they are handle, I have seen them in the UK at the Howletts zoo in the past and I do agree with you how stunning they are but they seem to be on the way out in western collections at this time, this species seems to need special care which is easier given in places like Singapore
 
I'd like to see emperor penguins, as far as i'm aware only a couple of zoo's in the world has them, I understand why but it would still be nice to see them as the majority of people won't ever.
 
brown hyena
chinstrap penguins
Impala
Topi
Hartebeest
White-tailed gnu
Forest elephant
Thompson's gazelle
Shoebill
Gharial
Marbled cat
Baird's & Mountain tapirs
Proboscis monkeys (I know, it wouldn't work!)
Ukari monkeys
Dingo
Tree kangaroos
Kodiak Bear
Sea Otter
Manatee
Tayra
Lesser tree shrew
Leadbeater's opossum
Long-beaked Echidna
Tiger quoll
Tasmanian devil

though, in REALITY, I'm just fine with seeing collections that can do wonderful and innovative things with a few wallabies, tamarins and lemurs!
Exciting as Edinburgh zoo is, I'm glad that mentality doesn't exist throughout all british zoos. I'm quite fond of those collections that get really good at keeping what they have and make few, careful additions over a longer period of time.
 
Well johnstoni has really mentioned all the species i would say but here are a select few that id like to see.
Thompsons Gazelle
Giant Eland
Shoebill
Red Howler Monkey
South China Tiger
Tasmanian Devil
Wombats
More Birds Of paradise
Gharial
Platypus
Dingo
Tree Kangaroo
 
Sand Cat said:
With all this exciting talk of Edinburgh getting Giant Pandas, it set me thinking: what other species that are presently absent from UK collections would you like to see brought over here?

My number one would definitly be pandas, but after them I'd probably say Douc Langurs - stunningly beautiful animals. Any different lemurs would be excellent too, particularly Diademed Sifakas! But I don't see that happening any time soon... mind you, it's not that long since I really wanted a UK collection to get ANY sifakas, so who knows?


Andrew.
Click to expand...

i know this is a bit late but i am sure the cotswolds wildlife park now has Verreaux's Crowned Sifaka in thier new lemur area.

Cotswold Wildlife Park and Gardens
 
It's easy to create a 'shopping list'. My two penn'orth would include:-
angwantibo
bearded sakis
fork-marked dwarf lemurs
golden snub-nosed monkeys
gyrfalcons
kagu
kaka
leafy sea dragons
little auks
new caledonian giant geckos
perentie
solenodon
solitary lories
tarsiers

But it's a bit pointless. Zoos in the UK have kept many of these species, usually without much success.
On the other hand, if you had told me forty years ago that UK zoos would have the largest breeding population of gorillas in Europe plus three species of lion tamarins, lots of bongo, Arabian oryx and even aye-ayes - I wouldn't have believed you. I'm sure that some of the species on these wishlists will eventually become established in UK zoos - but I've no idea which ones!

Alan
 
I'm sure the Sea life group imported some sea dragons a couple of years back, like late 90's era onwards....they ARE obtainable, but I think it is frowned upon and I don't think they bred anywhere in this country, so unless there are a couple of fighters you can probably bet they've died out. The same happened with some nautilus around the same time.
 
I saw weedy sea dragons at Blackpool SLC a few years ago, but I've never seen a leafy. There are still a few Nautilus around, The Deep have some (but they haven't got as many on display as they had a while ago).

Alan
 
I think I saw both species of sea dragon at the aquarium in Plymouth, but it was several years ago. I saw a nautilus in 1999 at Blackpool Sea Life Centre.
 
would love to see

giant eland
gerenuk
yellow backed duiker
Nubian ibex
Baird's tapir
impala
Tasmanian devil
douc langur

kagu
shoebill
African crowned eagle
 
Wow, I didnt realized how much I take species diversity for granted in the states. I didnt know the UK lacked so many cool species...a friend of mine breeds new caledonian giant geckos and has a couple dozen of them!
 
kiang said:
would love to see

giant eland
gerenuk
yellow backed duiker
Nubian ibex
Baird's tapir
impala
Tasmanian devil
douc langur
Click to expand...

just for the record- at least four of these species have been here in the past;

Gerenuk- Belle VueZoo
Impala- Marwell
Tassie Devil- London
Douc Langur- London, Howletts (Twycross?)

A pity none of them, or the others on your list, are in our zoos now. Douc langur really isn't feasible though as they proved they don't prosper. I think too that Impala and Gerenuk are both extremely'flighty' & nervous.
 
And when will we ever see Baikal seal and southern elephant seal in this country again, although Edinburgh have mentioned Baikal seal for their oceans and wetlands biome
 
kiang said:
Edinburgh also had a shoebill and a pair of Tasmanian devil
Click to expand...


Didn't know that. How long did each species survive? Have Shoebills been exhibited in any other Uk zoos in the last fifty years? I've only ever seen them in Frankfurt.
 
Both didn't survive long, the zoo has also had
southern elephant seal
Weddell's seal
Emperor penguin
Adelie penguin
kiwi
Komodo dragon
 
In the 1960s Chester had emperor penguins, they lived for about 2 days.

Didn't Bristol keep shoebills once, or am I imagining this?
 
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