ZooChat European Cup Round 2: Kolmarden vs Amsterdam

[CGSwans]

Kolmarden made its cup debut with a very handy category with which to see off Cotswold and Hamburg. It gets to carries ungulates with it into the first of the second round ties, up against Amsterdam. The second category? Miscellaneous mammals.

For anybody who is joining in ZooChat Cup festivities for the first time, the rules remain the same except that you now have two categories, not one, on which to cast your vote. The criteria remains yours to determine. You can choose how to weight the two categories, but you can’t go outside those two.

By the way, now that we’re into a head to head battle and with fewer lower-tier zoos left in the field, I’ll be going back to 3 day ties.

 

[TeaLovingDave]

I took the liberty of editing your poll so that it read "Amsterdam" and not "Ansterdam" as originally listed

 

[CGSwans]

I took the liberty of editing your poll so that it read "Amsterdam" and not "Ansterdam" as originally listed

Thanks. Not enough sleep this morning.

 

[Brum]

Artis beats Kolmarden in my opinion, mainly because Artis has some damn nice miscellaneous mammals and a decent ungulate collection, and whilst Kolmarden has those large ungulate enclosures it doesn't have much in the way of smaller species at all.

 

[pipaluk]

The voting seems emphatic , but I'm surprised having checked ZTL.
Amsterdam has a clear win on Misc mammals, 17 - 2, but I wouldn't say there are many real stand out rarities in their list.
On ungulates
Kolmarden would have a clear win (excluding domestics) of 23-13. To me it depends whether Kolmarden's ungulates contain any stand out rarities or Amsterdam has any really bad enclosures for ungulates, that might persuade me to vote for Kolmarden.

 

[Dassie rat]

Diprotodontians
Amsterdam: New Guinea ground cuscus, northern sugar glider, Tasmanian red-necked wallaby

Hyraxes
Amsterdam: Syrian rock hyrax

Armadillos
Amsterdam: Large hairy armadillo, southern three-banded armadillo

Pilosans
Amsterdam: Giant anteater, Linnaeus’ two-toed sloth

Tree shrews
Amsterdam: Northern tree shrew

Rodents
Amsterdam: Alpine marmot, black-tailed prairie dog, Cape porcupine, coypu, gundi, North American porcupine, Prevost’s squirrel

Bats
Amsterdam: Rodriguez flying fox, Seba’s short-tailed bat

Perissodactyls
Amsterdam: Malayan tapir
Kolmarden: Kulan, southern white rhinoceros

Cetartiodactyls
Amsterdam: Greater kudu, Java mouse deer, lowland anoa, nilgai, red river hog, Reeves’ muntjac, scimitar-horned oryx, springbok, Thomson’s gazelle
Kolmarden: Addax, Atlantic bottlenose dolphin, axis deer, black sable antelope, blackbuck, blesbok, blue wildebeest, common eland, common fallow deer, Eurasian moose, European bison, European wild boar, gemsbok, Kafue lechwe, Mishmi takin, Pere David’s deer


Amsterdam: 7 (diprotodontians, hyraxes, armadillos, pilosans, tree shrews, rodents, bats)
Kolmarden: 0

An easy win for Amsterdam

 

[pipaluk]

I don't understand how Kolmarden scores 0 when it clearly wins the last 2 categories? I'm sure there must be some logic to that, I just can't see it!

 

[kiang]

Amsterdam no longer hold nilgai

 

[Dassie rat]

I don't understand how Kolmarden scores 0 when it clearly wins the last 2 categories? I'm sure there must be some logic to that, I just can't see it!

I listed the orders that were only represented in one of the zoos. Amsterdam and Kolmarden both have perissodactyls and cetartiodactyls.

 

[pipaluk]

I listed the orders that were only represented in one of the zoos. Amsterdam and Kolmarden both have perissodactyls and cetartiodactyls.

But Kolmarden have Rodents, never mind I'm sure you know what you're doing. By this logic it appears that if one zoo has one species of an order and the other has 50, they draw? Surely not

 

[Dassie rat]

The two rodent species (mara and capybara) held by Kolmarden are also held by Amsterdam, so I didn't include them in my calculations. I am trying to give an idea of biodiversity at zoos and I realise that this leads to anomalies. I doubt if there is any method of comparing zoos that wouldn't involve anomalies, including subjectivity. I have decided not to compare zoos based on birds, as there are various methods of classifying them, or ectotherms, as ZTL doesn't list invertebrates.

 

[pipaluk]

No offence intended, but I'm going to have to look at ZTL for myself each time, because I think this system is majorly flawed I'm afraid! Fair enough, Amsterdam wins, but not 7-0, that is not right!

 

[FunkyGibbon]

I agree with Pipaluk. Last time when Dassie Rat posted both the unique species to each zoo as well as the species both had it was a genuinely useful resource that others could use as a baseline. I still disagreed with species count being the sole determining factor, but I could live with that.

This new 'system' is almost perverse (hyperbole intended) in the way that it can distort the image presented of what species are held by the zoos, and the scoring system based on 'unique' families is just the icing on the cake (even while writing this I noticed yet another flaw).

It's easy to criticise, and I'm certainly not offering to do the work myself, but given that Dassie Rat must have the 'species held by both zoos' list I really hope they can bring themselves to post it in future.

 

[vogelcommando]

Also voted Amsterdam because it still has such a large diversity in ( mostly ) decent enclosures.

 

[Dassie rat]

Hello Pipaluk and Funky Gibbon. CG Swan has said that Zoochatters can use their own criteria about which zoo wins in each category. I realise that choosing orders means that if one zoo has an aardvark or another representative of an order with few species, it may seem to have an unfair advantage over a zoo with many representatives from one order. I wanted to reduce the long lists I was producing,so that I could compare lists more easily.

I accept that any system of comparing zoos has its faults. Bad weather or no shows may give an unfair rating and would it really be fair to put up Walsrode against any other zoo in the 'Birds' category?

I'll continue with my current method for consistency,but I may change it for the next Zoochat European Cup.

 

[pipaluk]

Hello Pipaluk and Funky Gibbon. CG Swan has said that Zoochatters can use their own criteria about which zoo wins in each category. I realise that choosing orders means that if one zoo has an aardvark or another representative of an order with few species, it may seem to have an unfair advantage over a zoo with many representatives from one order. I wanted to reduce the long lists I was producing,so that I could compare lists more easily.

I accept that any system of comparing zoos has its faults. Bad weather or no shows may give an unfair rating and would it really be fair to put up Walsrode against any other zoo in the 'Birds' category?

I'll continue with my current method for consistency,but I may change it for the next Zoochat European Cup.

Of course you are entitled to use whatever method, we were both just suggesting the theory your rules was a bit flawed, I'll keep this as brief as possible, but say zoo A only has 2 species of carnivore nonspecific lion & wolf. ZOO B has 12 species of cat & 6 Canids but no lions or wolves, that is a draw by your rules?
Yet if zoo B has 2 cat species and 2 Canids including both lions & wolves it wins?

 

[Dassie rat]

Hello Pipaluk. If Zoo A and Zoo B competed on Carnivores and the only unique species they had belonged to the Canidae and Felidae, then that would be a draw. As the rules require a winner, I would then compare thenumber of species in each family per zoo. As Zoo B has more species of cats and more species of dogs, it would win 2-0.

 

[pipaluk]

Hello Pipaluk. If Zoo A and Zoo B competed on Carnivores and the only unique species they had belonged to the Canidae and Felidae, then that would be a draw. As the rules require a winner, I would then compare thenumber of species in each family per zoo. As Zoo B has more species of cats and more species of dogs, it would win 2-0.

Thanks you've just confirmed what I suggested, the first scenario should be a clear win, but isn't a win at all, whilst the 2nd much closer scenario is a 2-0 win! You don't need to explain any further

 

[Dassie rat]

Thanks Pipaluk

I'm glad that we sorted through the confusion.