equidae
Well-Known Member
Can't see this changing anytime soon, though it would be interesting if anyone ever engineered a tank imitating the water pressures those animals are used to.
Underrepresented Habitats
- Thread starter JVM
- Start date
They did this at Monterey Bay Aquarium, Into the Deep.
What other animals would you envision?
Minnesota has an exhibit based on the parts of Siberia immediately adjacent to Manchuria. It includes Amur Tiger, Amur Leopard, Sea Otter, Brown Bear, and Wild Boar (and formerly Rainbow Trout).
The Rainbow Trout might have returned. The water in their former (?)tank is to murky to tell.
This is an especially interesting one to me - I remember as a kid, Lincoln Park Zoo had an "Afghanistan Leopard" (Persian or Arabian Leopard today? not sure which) and an Arabian Oryx, so I had perceived at the time Arabian wildlife must be common, and was fascinated with the idea of such significant desert megafauna, but both species are long, long gone. Seems like it would be easy to build a cool Arabia exhibit with species of this nature.
Aardwolves don't occur in Arabia?
As well as the aforementioned Minnesota exhibit, which is a better example than mine to be clear, there is also Omaha's Asian Highlands exhibit which houses Amur tiger, Tufted deer and White-naped cranes, although the rest of it largely focuses on the Himalayas.
Good to know, I've never heard of this exhibit. And I'm not an expert on American zoos at all, therefore I mainly thought of European zoos when I wrote that reply about the lack of Manchurian enclosures.
For example cranes, Steller's sea eagle, Asian black bear, Tsushima leopard cats, Asian wapiti subspecies, etc.
These would be nice. I've never heard if Amy zoos doing this. Amur tigers could stand in for Caspian tigers.
I agree with prior opinions, especially concerning the Middle East and South American grasslands. However, I'll add a couple more;
- African and South American bamboo forests. This rather underrated habitat is often used with Asian animals in zoos (because pandas), but bamboo forests in these other continents can bring with them all sorts of recognizable species, like bongos, gorillas, jaguars and tapirs.
- The East Coast of North America (outside the USA and Canada, of course); decent enough exhibits could be made in Europe with this theme, with american black bears, moose, beavers, porcupines, wolves, bobcats...
- Mexican and Central American forests and jungles: for as much attention as the Amazon gets, I think this choice would still be a way to have a smiliar fauna, but with a twist; you still get jaguars, macaws and anteaters, but you can have Mexican spider monkeys and Morelet's crocodiles instead of more usual spider monkey and caiman species.
- Mongolia; this would be a really good theme for an open-ended safari park, with wild horses, camels, all sorts of mountain caprines, snow leopards and wolves, and of course a huge menagerie of birds of prey.
- Coastal mangroves forests; while it's usual in aquariums, showcasing smaller species like horseshoe crabs, fiddler crabs and mudskippers, I'd like to see larger animals, like crocodiles, hippos, tapirs, monkeys and even tigers and jaguars in such a setting, plus there's a huge potential for all manner of aquatic birds.
- African and South American bamboo forests. This rather underrated habitat is often used with Asian animals in zoos (because pandas), but bamboo forests in these other continents can bring with them all sorts of recognizable species, like bongos, gorillas, jaguars and tapirs.
- The East Coast of North America (outside the USA and Canada, of course); decent enough exhibits could be made in Europe with this theme, with american black bears, moose, beavers, porcupines, wolves, bobcats...
- Mexican and Central American forests and jungles: for as much attention as the Amazon gets, I think this choice would still be a way to have a smiliar fauna, but with a twist; you still get jaguars, macaws and anteaters, but you can have Mexican spider monkeys and Morelet's crocodiles instead of more usual spider monkey and caiman species.
- Mongolia; this would be a really good theme for an open-ended safari park, with wild horses, camels, all sorts of mountain caprines, snow leopards and wolves, and of course a huge menagerie of birds of prey.
- Coastal mangroves forests; while it's usual in aquariums, showcasing smaller species like horseshoe crabs, fiddler crabs and mudskippers, I'd like to see larger animals, like crocodiles, hippos, tapirs, monkeys and even tigers and jaguars in such a setting, plus there's a huge potential for all manner of aquatic birds.
A lot of aquatic habitats are either not represented at all or just "lumped" together in generic exhibits. Some I would like to see:
- Peat swamps and their inhabitants
- seagrass meadows
- rice paddies (asian paddie fields are often home to various gouramis and rasboras that are just shown in generic tanks)
- subtropical streams
- Peat swamps and their inhabitants
- seagrass meadows
- rice paddies (asian paddie fields are often home to various gouramis and rasboras that are just shown in generic tanks)
- subtropical streams
A Mongolian exhibit could thrive in a warm or cold climate. Imagine one of those with snow in it. The East Coast exhibit could also be changed slightly to be a North Woods one.
Aardwolf
Well-Known Member
I drew up designs years ago for one of my bosses - P horse, camel, cinereous vulture, white naked crane, swan goose, and Pallas cat, as well as a “Flaming Cliffs fossil wall” with a recreation of the famous raptor/Protoceratops fossil death scene. He expressed little interest in the concept. It languishes in my “well, I tried” file…
May I ask which zoo this was for?
Aardwolf
Well-Known Member
I'll tell you next time we chat. I'm trying not to name facilities I work at/have worked at on here to maintain a little anonymity. I similarly had a New Guinea rainforest exhibit design I tried to peddle to three zoos - two AZA, one non - also with lack of success
You know, I understand that and respect that. Let's discuss this elsewhere.
White naked crane? Should someone get them towels? Sorry I couldn't resist. Too bad your ideas weren't accepted.