Zoo design Central Europe vs British Isles

[Rajang-GOAT]

Something of a recent phenomenon, this - I gather that bears were a LOT more commonplace in British zoos until the early 1990s, when the cycle of zoo/antizoo hit a particularly strong patch of the latter and the standard of UK bear exhibits was singled out for particular criticism. A great number of collections which held bears at the time chose to either actively cease to keep them, or no longer replaced deceased animals, rather than have the expense of improving their facilities or entirely replacing them.

Indeed. Colchester had both brown bear and Asiatic black bear too.
I can recall bears in small seaside menageries too when I was small child. A sun bear in the small zoo in Peter Pan's Playground on the Southend seafront; brown bear cubs in the zoo on the Ramsgate seafront; a sloth bear (?) in Chalkwell Park...

Colchester decided to stop housing bears after the generation of bears that existed when the new owners came died because they had been in small cramped enclosures without stimulation and were overfed sweets. This caused much trouble because after the Tropeanos had built up enough money to rehome them they had many mental and physical problems. This was quite frankly traumatizing for everyone involved and Colchester zoo decided to stop keeping bears. In 2010 the Rare Species Conservation Centre offered a pair of young rescued Malayan sun bears along with other animals. After much consideration they were taken in and have been living there happily in there purpose built enclosure ever since.

 

[Rajang-GOAT]

We're definitely in the middle of something of a bear revival in the UK at present, mind you in terms of collections which have been actively going into bear species over the past decade or so, we have had the following:

Scottish Deer Centre (Brown Bear)
Camperdown (Brown Bear)
Five Sisters Zoo (Brown Bear)
Yorkshire Wildlife Park (Brown Bear, Polar Bear)
Wild Place (Brown Bear)
Wildwood (Brown Bear)
Edinburgh (Giant Panda, Sun Bear)
Wingham (Asiatic Black)
Highland Wildlife Park (Polar Bear)
Port Lympne (Spectacled Bear)
Noah's Ark (Spectacled Bear)
Chester (Sun Bear)
Colchester (Sun Bear)

So 15 arrivals across 13 collections - although one of these holdings (YWP Brown Bear) has admittedly recently ended.

Conversely, in the last decade only four collections have ceased to keep bears altogether:

Dudley (death of last animal)
Dartmoor (death of last animal)
Blair Drummond (last animal moved to another collection)
RSCC (closure of collection)

In 2010 the Rare Species Conservation Centre offered a pair of young rescued Malayan sun bears along with other animals. After much consideration they were taken in and have been living there happily in there purpose built enclosure ever since.

Colchester could be a bit less actively.

 

[Batto]

Should "Central Europe" not include other countries other than Germany?