The Largest Aviaries in the World

Not number 1 by any means but at least number 4 in the world (and number 1 for birds of prey) is the giant aviary at Les Aigles du Leman in Sciez, France. Almost 4 and a half acres (1.8ha).
 
There is an enormous aviary at the Crested Ibis Nature Reserve in the Yangxian country, Shaanxi, China. I could only find one picture in the internet:

https://youimg1.tripcdn.com/target/100s1f000001gx60vACD9_C_640_470.jpg

In life it looks absolutely gigantic, especially because it stands in the open country. It apparently holds only Crested Ibis and may not be open to the public from inside.

Who speaks Chinese and can find more details?


 
Not number 1 by any means but at least number 4 in the world (and number 1 for birds of prey) is the giant aviary at Les Aigles du Leman in Sciez, France. Almost 4 and a half acres (1.8ha).
Do you have a source with the dimensions?

I have to also try and include the Edward Youde Aviary in Hong Kong, which is amongst the largest, but the only size I can find is 3000 sq m (or 32,000 sq ft) but no dimensions.
 
There is an enormous aviary at the Crested Ibis Nature Reserve in the Yangxian country, Shaanxi, China. I could only find one picture in the internet:

https://youimg1.tripcdn.com/target/100s1f000001gx60vACD9_C_640_470.jpg

In life it looks absolutely gigantic, especially because it stands in the open country. It apparently holds only Crested Ibis and may not be open to the public from inside.

Who speaks Chinese and can find more details?


It is 20m high and 50m in diameter.
Breeding ecology and success of a reintroduced population of the endangered Crested Ibis Nipponia nippon | Bird Conservation International | Cambridge Core
 
I have to also try and include the Edward Youde Aviary in Hong Kong, which is amongst the largest, but the only size I can find is 3000 sq m (or 32,000 sq ft) but no dimensions.

"The area enclosed by the mesh is approximately 3 000 square metres, with its highest point 30 metres above the valley floor." by the website
 
Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary's Lost Valley Aviary is 2.5 acres and 38 metres tall at its highest point. A few photos are below but they don't really capture the full size of the aviary:
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I emailed the zoo to find out more about its exact size:

“At its highest point the aviary stands at 38 metres with approximately 2.5 acres of land inside the aviary itself.“
I quite like this aviary its been there quite some time now. Very glad to know it has more species inside than in the past. This type of aviary would do well at Australia zoo instead of the box style and straight footpath seen end to end.
 
I have updated the list in the first post.


Original listing:

1) Birds of Eden (South Africa)
2) Jurong Bird Park's Waterfall Aviary (Singapore)
3) Melaka Bird Park (Malaysia)
4) Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo's Simmons Aviary (USA) - due to an incorrect size of 4 acres whereas it is really only a third of that.
5) Islamabad Bird Park (Pakistan)
6) Bioparc Zoo de Doue's South American aviary (France)
7) Bioparque Temaikan's aviary (Argentina)
8-10) no firm listing but Zoo Miami's Wings of Asia (USA) and Flying High's walk-through aviary (Australia) noted.


Current listing:

1) Birds of Eden (South Africa)
2) Jurong Bird Park's Waterfall Aviary (Singapore)
3) Les Aigles du Leman's raptor aviary La Terre des Aigles (France)
4) Melaka Bird Park (Malaysia)
5) Islamabad Bird Park (Pakistan)
6) Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary's Lost Valley aviary (Australia)
7) Bioparc Zoo de Doue's South American aviary (France)
8) Bioparque Temaikan's aviary (Argentina)
9-11) Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo's Simmons Aviary (USA)
9-11) Zoo Miami's Wings of Asia (USA)
9-11) Flying High's walk-through aviary (Australia)

Numbers 3 and 4 are supposedly the same acreage but I don't know if the size which is always given for the Melaka Bird Park is accurate. Numbers 6 to 8 are all about the same acreage so I placed them in order of decreasing height of the aviary. Numbers 9-11 are all roughly the same acreage (probably) but sources are a bit variable. This also made it a "top eleven" rather than "top ten" list.

The KL Bird Park, which is very often quoted as being the largest aviary in the world, isn't included in the list because it is a series of connected aviaries rather than one single aviary and it is impossible to separate them out for measurements.

Also note that Jurong Bird Park will be closing in the near future so number two on the list will become void. But presumably the new aviaries at Mandai Bird Park will then be placed here.

I have to also try and include the Edward Youde Aviary in Hong Kong, which is amongst the largest, but the only size I can find is 3000 sq m (or 32,000 sq ft) but no dimensions.
And this aviary isn't included because when working out the size it turned out to be only 0.7 acres which is much smaller than all the others.
 
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I don't think it was mentionned there but Parrot World in France, which opened last year has a 1 hectare south-american walkthrough aviary so 8 suppose it must be in the list.

If course, not to forget that Beauval is planning a giant aviary based on south-american birds and expected to be between 2 and 3 hectares.
 
I don't think it was mentionned there but Parrot World in France, which opened last year has a 1 hectare south-american walkthrough aviary so 8 suppose it must be in the list.
I have added this in, at number eight.

Numbers six to nine are all one hectare in size so I arranged them by height:
6) Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary's Lost Valley aviary (Australia) is 38 metres high.
7) Bioparc Zoo de Doue's South American aviary (France) is 20 metres high.
8) Parrot World's South American aviary (France) is 15 metres high.
9) Bioparque Temaikan's aviary (Argentina) is 12 metres high.

The aviaries I had as numbers "9 to 11" I have now put as 10-equal.
 
3) Les Aigles du Leman's raptor aviary La Terre des Aigles (France)

During research for my 100 must-see exhibits threads, I actually measured this aviary on google maps. It's size is roughly 9000 square metres, so half of the claimed size.... I also measured Jurong's waterfall aviary and this one is more like 1.5 hectares than >2, but it's exact extent is hard to see...

It is shocking how many of these places overstate the actual size of these aviaries....
 
Good to see new posts in this thread as I know think about missing avaries :
- Réserve africaine de Sigean has a one hectare walkthrough aviary with a height between 6 and 10 meters. The size must be good as I visited it last year and had the same feeling as in Doué's one.
- Hippopotamuses reserve in beauval is 7.000 m2 and 26/28 meters tall so one of the tallest at least.
 
I decided to measure them all using google maps and the sizes are quite often of quite wrong...

1) Birds of Eden (South Africa)

Around 2.3 hectares, so actually correct :p

4) Melaka Bird Park (Malaysia)

More like 5000 square metres not 1.8 hectares

5) Islamabad Bird Park (Pakistan)

Around 1.1 hectares, not 1.5 hectares

6) Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary's Lost Valley aviary (Australia)

I could not clearly this aviary from satellite images. But based on the zoo map and zoo size, I highly doubt it should be anywhere near this list. If the aviary I can see on google maps is indeed this aviary it is closer to 2500 square metres....

7) Bioparc Zoo de Doue's South American aviary (France)

Closer to 8000 square metres than 1 hectare.

The parrot world aviary is indeed almost 1 hectare and the African aviary in Sigean about 9000 square metres

8) Bioparque Temaikan's aviary (Argentina)

The number here is maybe a combined figure for all aviaries in the park. The largest aviary I can see (which might well be three) is only 3500 square metres....

9-11) Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo's Simmons Aviary (USA)

This one is 5800 square metres.

9-11) Zoo Miami's Wings of Asia (USA)

About 5000 square metres.

9-11) Flying High's walk-through aviary (Australia)

Around 4400 square metres.
 
Out of curiosity, @lintworm, it would be interesting to know the size of three aviaries that I've seen in recent years. This one wouldn't make the 'largest aviary list', but I'm intrigued to find out how big the Steller's Sea Eagle aviary at Scandinavian Wildlife Park (Denmark) is.

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The other is the enormous African Waters aviary at Odense Zoo (Denmark):

full


Lastly, there is the huge aviary at Mondo Verde (Netherlands) that the zoo claims is the largest in Europe. It's big, but the zoo is surely exaggerating.

full
 
Out of curiosity, @lintworm, it would be interesting to know the size of three aviaries that I've seen in recent years. This one wouldn't make the 'largest aviary list', but I'm intrigued to find out how big the Steller's Sea Eagle aviary at Scandinavian Wildlife Park (Denmark) is.

full


The other is the enormous African Waters aviary at Odense Zoo (Denmark):

full


Lastly, there is the huge aviary at Mondo Verde (Netherlands) that the zoo claims is the largest in Europe. It's big, but the zoo is surely exaggerating.

full

The first aviary measures about .92 acres (3700 sq meters). So pretty massive especially for one species.
 
Out of curiosity, @lintworm, it would be interesting to know the size of three aviaries that I've seen in recent years. This one wouldn't make the 'largest aviary list', but I'm intrigued to find out how big the Steller's Sea Eagle aviary at Scandinavian Wildlife Park (Denmark) is.

full


The other is the enormous African Waters aviary at Odense Zoo (Denmark):

full


Lastly, there is the huge aviary at Mondo Verde (Netherlands) that the zoo claims is the largest in Europe. It's big, but the zoo is surely exaggerating.

full

Odense is roughly 3500 square metres, Mondo Verde about 4400 square metres and the one in Skandinavisk Dyrepark seems about 3000 square metres itself and as a complex 3900 square metres. So all are big, but not nearly the size to belong to the big boys.
 
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