Willowbank Wildlife Reserve Willowbank Turns 40

[zooboy28]

One of New Zealand's largest "small" zoos turned 40 yesterday:

Full story & photos here: Willowbank grew from small beginnings - national | Stuff.co.nz

Now an established Christchurch attraction, Willowbank Wildlife Reserve began as a very lean and basic operation 40 years ago.

More than 100 past and present staff members gathered yesterday to mark the milestone.

Co-founder Kathy Rangiwananga said she wondered if anyone would even turn up when she and former husband Michael Willis opened the gates to the public in 1974.

"We opened with virtually nothing. We had one llama, some Captain Cook pigs, a sheep and half a dozen aviaries."

The couple had decided to open the gates and grow the operation as they went.

"Every dollar we got went back in to it," she said.

A lot has changed since then. Visitors were charged 25 cents and there was just two staff members in 1974 - Willis and Rangiwananga.

"There were no buildings but we put up a gateway and Michael would collect the money in a shoebox," she said.

Now, an adult fee is $27.50 and 40 staff manage the attraction.

In addition to housing 500 animals, the facility hosts a Maori cultural experience, night tours, a wildlife hospital and a kiwi breeding programme.

Both Willis and Rangiwananga were driven by their shared love for animals when they bought the 18-hectare property.

"It was an evolving dream but I don't think either of us had any idea about where it would go."

Before opening Willowbank, the pair had worked with an animal rescue centre in England.

"We went and bought a monkey from a pet store and kept it in our flat," Rangiwananga said.

On returning to New Zealand, they worked at a hunting and fishing lodge in Te Anau before buying the land for Willowbank.

Enabling people to get close to the animals was a key aim and a feature popular from the start.

"Michael wanted a place where you got a one-on-one relationship with the animals."

Farm animals such as the kune kune pigs were still the most popular animals for locals, while tourists were charmed by the cheeky kea, Rangiwananga said.

The evolution of the attraction consumed Willis and Rangiwananga from the beginning but both were now starting to hand over the reins to their children, Kirsty and Mark, she said.

 

[Chlidonias]

I went to Willowbank yesterday and it is looking good, as always. There are a couple of new aviaries since last time I was there, and a very nice one for Blue Duck is currently being built where the Ostrich yard used to be (their Ostrich was killed in a storm last year). There were baby Tuatara on show, and some new Australian Water Dragons.

I consider Willowbank to be one of the "major" ("main", "proper", choose your own descriptive) zoos in NZ, even though it is fairly small and the range of exotic mammals is tiny (basically otters, wallabies, ruffed and ring-tailed lemurs, capuchins, siamang), which I think speaks more of the low number of zoos in the country with exotics. However I like it better than Orana Park and I generally spend as long on a visit at Willowbank as I do at Wellington Zoo. (To qualify that, Wellington Zoo is still easily my second favourite zoo in NZ after Auckland Zoo).

 

[Pertinax]

I consider Willowbank to be one of the "major" ("main", "proper", choose your own descriptive) zoos in NZ, even though it is fairly small and the range of exotic mammals is tiny (basically otters, wallabies, ruffed and ring-tailed lemurs, capuchins, siamang), which I think speaks more of the low number of zoos in the country with exotics.

When in NZ I was pleasantly surpised to find this place as I was somewhat starved of zoos while there. I remember it being pretty small though and I didn't spend too long there. They had chimps at the time, which I was surprised to see, but I don't think they still have them now. It was the first place I saw KuneKune pigs too.

 

[Chlidonias]

When in NZ I was pleasantly surpised to find this place as I was somewhat starved of zoos while there. I remember it being pretty small though and I didn't spend too long there. They had chimps at the time, which I was surprised to see, but I don't think they still have them now. It was the first place I saw KuneKune pigs too.

it is quite small (much smaller than Auckland, Wellington, etc) but it holds its own well. The chimps were ex-circus animals, a pair plus their daughter. The male and daughter went to Mogo in Australia a few years ago (the female had died by then). The male died at Mogo and the daughter is now at Rockhampton in Queensland.

 

[Pertinax]

The chimps were ex-circus animals, a pair plus their daughter. The male and daughter went to Mogo in Australia a few years ago (the female had died by then). The male died at Mogo and the daughter is now at Rockhampton in Queensland.

There was a young male(son) too after the daughter, but I know when they left it was only the father & daughter. Apparently, according to a notice at Willowbank about their history, at one time the original pair had been living on an 'island' at/near Dunedin.

 

[Chlidonias]

There was a young male(son) too after the daughter, but I know when they left it was only the father & daughter. Apparently, according to a notice at Willowbank about their history, at one time the original pair had been living on an 'island' at/near Dunedin.

there's a suburb in Dunedin called Green Island, so it may have been there.

The male Charlie was from the Whirling Brothers Circus and toured NZ for many years before retiring to Willowbank (he was originally wild-caught and imported from England, probably in the 60s). The female Coco was born at Taronga and was the one who came to Willowbank from Dunedin.

I'm not sure of the rest of the details -- Steve would probably know? According to press releases at the time of the chimps moving to Mogo both Charlie and Samantha (the daughter) had been at Willowbank since 1985 which implies they arrived together. I'm not sure if that means Charlie also came from Dunedin with Coco and Samantha had already been born then (so all three chimps arrived at Willowbank as a family group), or if it was a mistake in the reporting.

I'm not sure about the male offspring you mention. He may have died or gone back to the circus. I do remember back in the late 80s/early 90s there was a bit of a uproar in the papers about a baby chimp born at Willowbank being at the centre of a court case regarding ownership between Willowbank and the circus (the latter of which, if my memory is correct, still claimed ownership of the adult pair Charlie and Coco).

 

[Pertinax]

I'm not sure about the male offspring you mention. He may have died or gone back to the circus. I do remember back in the late 80s/early 90s there was a bit of a uproar in the papers about a baby chimp born at Willowbank being at the centre of a court case regarding ownership between Willowbank and the circus (the latter of which, if my memory is correct, still claimed ownership of the adult pair Charlie and Coco).

That's really interesting about their family history. I had presumed both offspring were born at Willowbank but that was without being aware of their full history. There were definately four when I saw them circa 1991- the daughter was already quite large and the male baby much smaller. I wonder if the circus got him back- a pity if they did as he would have been seperated from the others.

 

[Chlidonias]

Relating to the above couple of posts, I have found two newspaper articles in my collection.

The first is from December 1987 and is about the birth of a baby chimp at Willowbank. It was thought to be a female and would be named Lisa if so. [The baby turned out to be a male and was named Milo]. The article mentions that the daughter Samantha was five years old, making her birth year 1982. There is a line in the article saying "Last year the parents were at the centre of an ownership wrangle" [i.e. with the circus, as in post #6 above]. It goes on to say that Willowbank "has since been offered large sums of money for her [Samantha] from circus handlers."

The second is from June 1994, and is only a filler snippet rather than an actual article, but says that there are three chimps at Willowbank - Charlie, Samantha, and Milo.

So the mother Coco [or Koko, as it is spelled in the earlier article] had died between 1991 when Pertinax visited (when he saw all four chimps) and 1994. By the time the chimps moved to Mogo in 2009, Milo had also gone but I don't know if he died (he would have only been 21) or went elsewhere at some point.