Zootrip report 2024; southern German and Austria

ralph

ralph

Well-Known Member
10+ year member
ZOOTRIP REPORT:

Zoo Heidelberg. 14-04-2024.
(Photo's are to be uploaded to the Zoochat Gallery at a later date)

I just returned from my annual zootrip, this time to southern Germany and Austria, making use of the 49-euro ticket that grants access to the majority of the public transport system in Germany (including the horrible, horrible Deutsche Bahn)
With this trip, I added 3 German zoos (Nurnberg, Munchen, Augsburg), a wildpark (Oberwald) 2 Austrian zoos (Salzburg, Innsbruck), and 2 musea with a living animal collection (Haus der Natur in Salzburg and the Staatliches Museum für Naturkunde Karlsruhe) to my zoo list. I also did revisits to Heidelberg and Zoo Karlsruhe, which I visited before in 2007 and which I had only foggy memories of. My zoo/aquarium list now stands at 144 in 20 countries.

First up was my revisit to Zoo Heidelberg. Because it's quite a long journey from the Netherlands to the south of Germany and Austria, I decided to head down to Heidelberg first, stay a night there, visit the zoo in the morning/early afternoon, and then continue my journey to Nuremberg later that same day.

As stated above, I visited Zoo Heidelberg before in 2007 (in a trip that also included Neunkirchen,
Saarbrücken, Karlsruhe, Amneville, Mulhouse, Zurich and Basel; the latter 2 I revisited in 2013). My memories of the zoo were quite foggy, and since I lost a lot of my photo's from that time, I didn't have much to go on. I remembered seeing tufted deers, ring-tailed mongooses and golden cats, but much else of it was a blur. Of course, a lot must have changed in 17 years, so a revisit to this zoo was very welcome.

My visit was on a sunny, warm sunday (the rest of the trip would be much colder) but the crowds were not too bad. I arrived a bit before opening times, and I was happy I could spend the few minutes enjoying the (quite active) Syrian brown bears that you can see from outside the zoo. They're a lovely subspecies I hadn't encountered in a while, and their enclosure (which was upgraded since 2007) was very decent.

Once inside, I started my visit in the 'Küstenpanorama', a very nice walk-through aviary for water birds which I remember was there in 2007 as well. I really enjoyed the antics of the inca terns, harlequin ducks, avocets, oystercatchers and ruffs.

Right next to the aviary were the Malagasy carnivores. The fossa was inactive and poorly visible, but I did get to enjoy some very active ring-tailed mongooses, including a mother with her cub.

Next up where the (inactive) red panda and tufted deer (one of the enclosures I somehow remembered, probably because in 2007 I saw tufted deer for the first time), and the mediocre enclosures for rufous hornbills, black-and-white ruffed lemurs and (unsigned) white cockatoo.

From there I passed the elephant enclosure (I'll revisit that later), the honeybee-exposition and the ''Lebensraum Schilf'' aviaries. One of the aviaries was home to little owls, the other to reed bunting, European turtle dove, hoopoe and bluethroats. It would have been my first time seeing the latter species in a zoo, but they were no-shows (fortunately I've seen them in the wild plenty of times).
From there I visited mouse house (cute 'domestic setting' enclosures mice and rats) and the very nice raccoon/mink enclosure, but both of those species were no-shows. A small aviary for laughingthrushes and Edwards pheasants brings me to the enclosure of the golden cat, a target species for me (I've seen them before, but it had been several years). I was very happy to see the animal walking around (luckily no pacing) but the enclosure is not very photography-friendly.
Across the golden cats are the water birds (pelicans, ducks, flamingo's) but that's barely worth the mention.

After that I went to the Carnivore House. I somewhat expected to see some subpar enclosures for the lions and tigers, but they were actually not that bad. I saw three Sumatran tigers all sharing one enclosure, as the seperation cage was connected to the main enclosure, giving the animals plenty of room to enjoy. The main enclosure was well planted and gave the tigers the opportunity to hide from the public as some parts of the enclosure are hard to look into (but two of them were in plain sight anyway)
The lion enclosure was quite simple, but spacious enough for two animals (1.1). The secondary (seperation?) enclosure is horribly small though and I'm happy it wasn't currently in use. Definitely a relic from the old days. There's a elevated viewing platform for the visitors to give a better view of the lions and the enclosure itself.
The indoor enclosures for the lions and tigers were the standard, small cages we see so often in Carnivore houses. From the Carnivore house there's also an addition viewing in the lion enclosure, as well as the only viewing into the striped skunk habitat, which were also no-shows.
In addition to carnivores, there's also a few terraria. One of them has a black-breasted leaf turtle, the other has Maranon and demonic poison frogs. Unfortunately I was not able to find the Demonic poison frog, a species that is kept only in this zoo worldwide according to ZTL.

Adjacent to the carnivore house was a nicely done enclosure for porcupines and meerkats. The enclosures was designed in a way you can get to eye-level with the meerkats, and the porcupines have a visible den, which they were currently using because they had cubs!
Across from the meerkats is a large enclosure for white-necked ravens. Also closeby is a really good, large aviary for keas.

The enclosure for South-American sea lions unfortunately was small, old and ugly and just not suitable in my opinion. It was the first thing I really disliked about the zoo (but not the last)
The house for giant tortoised was closed due to storm damage to the roof (the tortoises temporarily reside in Prague). On my way to the southeastern corner of the zoo which I skipped previously, I passed some very standard enclosures for camels and snowy owls, as well as red-crowned cranes. The griffon vultures and ravens are up next, in a nice good-sized aviary, followed by hooded vultures and southern ground hornbills. The next enclosure currently/temporarily held a new arrival to the zoo; a young southern cassowary from Avifauna, which was rejected by its father.

The Africa house is a simple building featuring the stables for the savannah animals (zebra and blesbok) as well as 2 terraria (Burmese python, Egyption tortoise + black hardun). Although the Africa house is nothing special, I always enjoy when an animal house also has a few 'side' enclosures for smaller species (just like the carnivore house did). It gives you something to watch when the main species are in their outside paddocks. It's one of the reasons I love zoos like Plzen and Prague so much!

The African savannah enclosure itself was also very simple (and spacious enough for two species), but I was much more interested in the aviaries across from them. The walk-through South-American aviary was an highlight, and I'm pretty sure it did not yet exist in 2007. Besides the obvious birds (black-necked stilt, lake ducks, socorro doves, turquoise tanagers, grey-breasted parakeets, red-crowned amazons, sunbitterns) there were also map turtles, juvenile paddlefishes and two-toed sloths here. There's an underwater viewing where you can enjoy seeing the lake ducks and turtles dive and the paddlefishes swim by. For the sloths, there's ropes and other objects to climb and I loved seeing them transverse the enclosure. Their indoor enclosure is viewable as well. I think this aviary is a lovely piece of zoo design.
The other aviaries were more simple, and held species like bali myna, Palawan peacock pheasant (not seen), Siamese fireback, crested wood partridge, rainbow lorikeet, Java sparrow, crowned pigeon, Papuan hornbill (the female was in her tree-shaped nest box, with the male bringing her food!) toco toucan, Brasilian tanager (not seen), village weaver, and my personal favorite; the Yellow-crowned gonolek.

I quite like the elephant house and the elephant enclosure. The biggest downside was its size as it's not particulary large, but it is made up by the natural structure and enrichment. The elephants had a choice of being indoors or outdoors and I saw them do both.

The elephant house is home to one other species; the indoor enclosure for binturongs is located at the entrance hall of the building. It's pretty good, as is their outdoor enclosure. What makes it even better is that the binturongs have a access to a 'tunnel' that goes over the visitors head and into the enclosure for the small-clawed otters. That gives the binturongs three enclosures in total (indoor, outdoor, and the otter enclosure) although they both decided the tunnel was the best spot to hang out. The otter enclosure was really nice as well, including ofcourse a water feature with underwater viewing. The otters were outside, but unfortunately sleeping.

Before visiting the last part of the zoo, I went back to the golden cat but it wasn't visible anymore. I also tried to find the demonic poison frog again, but again I had no luck.

Next to the sea lions is the entrance to the walk-through aviary signed as 'Ibisvolieren' on the map. I quite enjoyed this simple yet nice aviary. I spotted most of the birds; an European roller, European bee-eaters, Chukar partridges, waldrapps, northern lapwings, European thick-knees, ferruginous ducks and a white-headed duck. The only species that was signed that I did not see was the marbled teal.
Next to this European-themed aviary is another aviary, this one is not a walk-through and features birds from South-America. I saw boat-billed herons, roseate spoonbills, scarlet ibisses, black-faced ibisses, southern lapwings and unsigned white-faced whistling ducks.
After the aviaries I came across a very basic enclosure for prairie dogs.

The kangaroos had left the zoo and their former enclosure is now a construction site. Due to time constraints, I skipped the petting zoo/barnyard area/Explo-Halle, potientally also missing out on the European hamsters, and went straight for the Great Ape house and lemur enclosure.

I initially did not remember the great ape enclosures for this zoo, but when I saw it, the memories returned. Zoo Heidelberg must have what is the worst gorilla enclosure I've ever seen. It's ugly, cramped open-topped and offers the gorilla's very little enrichment or privacy. It's really not much more than a piece of grass and a few dead tree stumps with a concrete background. Saddening to see, and it almost ruined this zoo for me. Luckily, the aforementioned constructions works are for a new gorilla enclosure, so in a few years the gorilla's will (hopefully) finally get an enclosure worthy of them.
The adjacent chimpanzee enclosure is slightly better than the gorilla enclosure, but still not good. It's somewhat larger, and netted over so the chimps can climb a little bit, but it's all very below average still.

A few meters further, the lemur enclosure was decent enough. It's a medium-sized cage with some good height to it, climbing structures and a lot of vegetation, providing the lemurs with privacy. Besides the ever-present ring-tailed lemurs, this enclosures also keeps a pair of lovely crowned lemurs, and even more excitingly, crowned sifaka's (they should have two although I only saw one), a species I just absolutely adore. I have now seen 4 out of 5 zoos with this species. (there were no sifaka's in Heidelberg in 2007)

Almost just as bad as the great ape enclosures is the enclosure for white-naped mangabey. They are a bunch of small, ugly steel cages. Three small cages were linked together, adding up the amount of space these animals have, but it's still not an enclosure any zoo should be proud of. They do luckily provide the animals with natural substrate and plenty of climbing opportunities.

The final primate species of the Great Ape house are emperor tamarins, who have pretty good indoor and outdoor enclosures, connected through an overhead tunnel. They share their indoor space with three-banded armadillo's (another no-show)
The other indoor enclosures for the primates are of the familiar, old Monkey House style. I did not like the building at all.
Besides the primates and armadillos this building is also supposed to have a number of free-ranging birds. It was really quiet in the building though, and I only heard and saw a couple of red-whiskered bulbuls. I did not see any of the other birds that were signed here, like the violet turaco. I was especially disappointed in not being able to see the pied hornbill, as it would have been a new species (Walsrode only got them after my last visit). I have to say the building did not really work well for spotting birds as there were a lot of 'blind spots'.

Heidelberg has another monkey house, the 'Kleines Affenhaus'. This features three monkey species; Roloway guenon, grey langur and golden lion tamarin.This is another very basic building with simple cages for the animals. Especially the grey langurs have very little space because of their large size; their enclosure would suit squirrel monkeys better and I honestly don't understand why the zoo hasn't replaced the langurs with something smaller as of yet.
(I also saw a ring-tailed mongoose here, sharing the enclosure with the langurs. And there's a small enclosures for degu's in the building as well.)

The last enclosure I visited was for another monkey species; resus macaques. Ironically, this must have been the best enclosure for this species I've come across as this is a species that usually gets shifted in zoos when it comes to enclosure quality.
It is a green, good-sized, open-topped enclosure, but it does lack in the climbing opportunities.

And that concludes my revisit to the Heidelberg Zoo. Overall, I enjoyed the zoo, even though not much really stood out and it's not a zoo I'd except anyone to add to their must-see list.
The zoo is brough down immensively by it's very subpar enclosures for primates (and sea lions as well) but tit also offers plenty of good things. I really liked the aviaries in this zoo, especially the walk-through ones. I also really enjoyed the elephant house with the superb binturong enclosure, some very active Syrian brown bears, the racoon enclosure (despite not seeing any animals there) and the resus macaques. The zoo also offers a few interesting species with sifaka and Asian golden cat as the highlights.

Wait a minute. No, this wasn't it. In the entrance/exit building, after going through the gift shop, is one more terrarium. It houses 3 species; Terrible poison frog, blessed poison frog and Graham's anole. The latter 2 species I'd never seen before (the anole was a no-show for me in Duisburg). Unfortunately I had a bus and then a train to catch to get to Nurnberg, so I didn't really have time to look for these animals. I managed to find the anole, but had to go before being able to find the frogs.

I got on the bus, then the train and arrived in Nurnberg that same evening. The next day would be my very first visit to a zoo than has been very high on my list for a long time; Tiergarten Nurnberg!
 
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Thanks very much for your review of Heidelberg Zoo. From your comments, it very much sounds like a hit-and-miss facility, with some particularly poor primate exhibits. I'm looking forward to your remarks about Tiergarten Nurnberg.
 
Wonderful review Ralph, of a medium-sized zoo that for some reason I am really fond of.

It is amazing how very different the impressions can be between visitors to the same garden. I visited the zoo in Heidelberg 3 times and was charmed each time by the intimate atmosphere and interesting collection.

In the report of my last visit in 2022, I wrote, among other things, "The Heidelberg Zoo is a moody garden located in the city's university district on the spot where the main cemetery used to be. The species list includes a few crowd-pullers supplemented by a range of special species that are of particular interest to primate and bird lovers. The entire garden exudes tranquillity and intimacy. There are no exceptional complexes or enclosures to be seen, but apart from the (great apes)/monkeys there are no real weak points. Snacks and drinks are available on the stately zoo terrace near the entrance, or in the jungle kiosk next to the cats. A zoo that absolutely does not disappoint!"

I visited the zoo every time in summer, maybe that makes a difference.

Apparently the greater kudu are gone from the 1977 African savannah, an exhibit that imo adds great charm with its old trees and watering holes.

In the Great Ape building, I eventually saw all the birds but it is indeed a bit of a search there.

Were there no more hooded vultures among the white-necked raven?

Agreed with your opinion for the sea lions and monkeys. The revamped monkey building is a disappointment as the cages have apparently not been enlarged, which is really needed for both the grey langur and Roloway guenon. The latter were in 2022 temporarily housed in one of cages of the Great Ape House and it is planned that de Roloway guenons will join the western lowland gorilla in the new enclosure.
 
Thanks for the replies.

@snowleopard. Yes that sums it up pretty nicely. Although in all honestly, almost every zoo is 'hit-and-miss'. For me, Heidelberg has only a few misses, but those misses are really huge misses. When the zoo finishes upgrading the primate enclosures, there won't be much to dislike about the zoo (except the sea lion pool)

@Philipine eagle Don't get me wrong, I like Heidelberg Zoo. It just didn't stood out as much because in this trip, it had to compete with the likes of Nürnberg, Hellabrunn, Salzburg and Innsbruck! In my opinion, it is not a must-see zoo, but it's also not a zoo anyone should ignore while in the area. It was also not the most disappointing zoo of this trip. I don't think the time of year was much a factor in my enjoyment of the zoo, as this was the best day of the trip in that regard.

Yes, the greater kudus are gone. The savannah is just home to zebras and blesbok now (and guineafowl). I suspect the reason might either be confrontations between species, or the limited amount of stables, as the outdoor enclosure is definitely spacious enough for 3 species of hoofstock.

Glad to read you did manage to find all the birds. Maybe I'd had more luck if I visited the building in the morning.

The hooded vultures are still in the zoo, they were in an aviary next to the griffon vultures (formerly Stellers sea eagles) which they shared with ground hornbills (this aviary is located between the cranes and the Africa House. I did mention it in my report, but you might have missed it)

I'm really happy to read the guenons will get to share the new gorilla enclosure as their current housing is just horrendous.
I'm hoping after the guenons move to their new home, their current enclosure will be merged with the langur enclosure. And hopefully, the zoo will implement further upgrades to the small monkey house for the sake of the langurs.
 
DAY 2

Tiergarten Nürnberg. 15-04-2024.
PART 1

My second zoo of this zootrip was the one I was probably looking forward to the most; Tiergarten Nürnberg. It is a zoo I've seen mentioned on people's list of favorite zoos multiple times, and there has to be a reason for it.

The zoo has some famous enclosures I really wanted to see for myself (the manatee house, the desert house, the yellow-throated marten enclosure...). Additionally, the zoo also has a really nice collection of animals, including some of my personal favorite species, as well as a few species I had not seen before, with the striped weasel being my main target.


That morning, I woke up in Nürnberg which ment having to take only a short tram ride from my hotel to the zoo. Because I couldn't stay until closing time, I wanted to be there early and I arrived at the zoo a little after 8 (Tierpark Nürnberg was the only zoo of this trip that opened at 8; all others opened at 9). The weather forecast predicted a quite cold, windy day with some periods of rain; eventually, it was better than predicted; it rained a bit, but the son was present a lot as well. It was however, quite cold and windy throughout the entire day.


Immediately after going through the entrance, there's a pathway on the left side that takes you to the Naturkundehaus, the zoo's Education Building. Even though I was aware this building also has some living animals inside of it, I decided to skip it for now and head immediately to the Giraffe House.


The Giraffe House is home to three (techinally four) species. The first animals I saw here were the squirrel monkeys in their indoor enclosure in front of the giraffe building. It's quite a spacious enclosure with ample covered (it was raining ever so slightly) glass viewing. (There's even more viewing opportunies from inside the giraffe house itself.) Next to it is a equally spacious outdoor cage for these small monkeys. But what makes this enclosure even better, is the second outdoor enclosure these monkeys have access to; a lush island with living trees. The island is connected to the indoor enclosure by some fake vines that go over the visitors head. The squirrel monkey enclosure is just fantastic! This zoo is immediately off to a good start.


The second (and third) species in the building are of course, the giraffes. One reticulated and one rothschild’s giraffe are the current inhabitants. The indoor enclosures for the giraffes are nothing special; they're the typical 'giraffe house' style stables we find in a lot of zoos. The outdoor enclosure for the giraffes is a very green, lush paddock with a beautiful backdrop of trees and other foliage. Beautiful!


Finally, the giraffe house is home to a real rarity, a stunning species of small carnivore; the striped weasel. The zoo keeps multiple individuals of this species, and has bred them. Two enclosures are found at the Desert House, another is found right here in the giraffe house. The enclosure is large for such a tiny creature, and consists of both an indoor and outdoor part, about equal in size. The enclosure has different hiding places for the weasels. Unsurprisingly, the weasel in this enclosure was a no-show.

Because the weasels recently had offspring, two additional 'pet store rodent cage' type of enclosures were temporarily placed inside the giraffe house. No luck with seeing any weasels in here either. This ment I had to get lucky at the Desert House, or I'd have to return to the Giraffe House at a later time to try again.


I left the giraffe house and went to view the enclosure immediately across from it. A large paddock is home to Eastern grey kangaroos and emus. Most of the enclosure is a green field of grass, but there's patches of sand as well, and the backside of the enclosure is forest; the kangaroos and emus could therefor 'hide' from the publics view if they'd want.


Next up is the mixed enclosure for meerkats and yellow mongooses. Again, this enclosure is spacious, well-vegetated and caters to the animals' needs very well. I haven't seen many zoos that mix two species of mongoose, but the animals seemed to get along great, warming up under the heat lamps together.


The next animals I came across were the crowned lemurs; a species I really like and which I had just seen the day prior in Heidelberg. The lemur enclosure consists of three medium-sized tent-shaped netted enclosures. I'd say each of these enclosures on itself would be inadequate for the species, but since all three enclosures were connected, the lemurs had plenty of space to roam and climb around in. They also had access to their indoor enclosure ,which is not viewable to the public. I saw 1 male and 3 female lemurs.


At this point I had come across a fork in the road with 3 possible paths for me to chose from. I decided to take the middle road, which lead me to the enclosure for Guinea baboons. Baboons are not my favorite animals, but since I've ever only seen this particular species once before (in Paris) I did spend some time at the enclosure watching the baboons do their baboon things (eat, fight, and hump each other). The enclosure itself looks great; it's surrounded by a moat of water, the rock wall backdrop really adds to the natural look, and there are a lot of rocks and dead trees for the monkeys to climb on. However, I'm not entirely convinced the size is adequate enough considering how many baboons are in this enclosure.


I continued my walk and came across the enclosure known as the 'Mediterraneum’ next, a very natural looking enclosure for ground squirrels and European reptiles. I really enjoyed watching the very active, very cute squirrels. I didn't see much reptiles, probably because of how cold it was that day. I only managed to spot one marginated tortoise; I didn't see the Hermann's tortoises, European pond turtles, ocellated lizards or legless lizards that were also signed here.


I walked a bit further and found myself surrounded by multiple enclosures; sea lions as well as the entrance to the Manatee House on my right side, bat-eared foxes on my left, and the gorilla/aquarium house right ahead. Unfortunately, the bat-eared fox enclosure was temporarily empty.


Even though I really wanted to see the Manatee House, I decided to check out the Gorilla House first.

Right next to the bat-eared fox enclosure is a spacious, lush outdoor enclosure for the gorilla's and barbary macaques. It wasn't quite clear if this is a mixed enclosure, or if these species rotate. Either way, neither species seemed to be out.

Right next to the entrance of the gorilla house is a very simple enclosure for hyacinth macaw. After entering the building, there's the viewing into the indoor enclosure for the macaws.

I quite disliked this enclosure; it's not necessarily bad, it's just an ugly steel cage and it didn't fit in with what I've seen of the zoo up until then. (I didn't see the macaws indoors or outdoors)

Before entering the 'main' hall of the building, you'll find a tank for Lake Patzcuaro salamanders.


The main hall of the building has the gorilla indoor enclosure on one side, and a selection of various aquaria on the other.

The gorilla indoor enclosures are the classic Ape House style. Devidable into multiple sections, glass viewing panels, concrete floor, iron mesh ceiling with ropes attrached to it… Not terrible, not great, definitely not impressive. The gorilla's were all indoors, but inactive, so I spent very little time here.


Luckily, the building also features some small tanks with various aquatic animals; there is an aquarium with African cichlids, a mangrove tank with mudskippers and an Amazon tank with rubber eels and a few small fishes. There are Kaiser's spotted newts, a tank with anglerfish, razorfishes and seahorses, an African tank with reedfish and Congo tetras, and of course 2 coral reef tanks, housing species like turkeyfish, leopard triggerfish, marbled dragonet, clownfish and different kinds of wrasses.


I exited the Gorilla/Aquarium house, and there I stumbled upon the enclosures for white-handed gibbon enclosures. I was disappointed. They are typical cages with glass viewing below and metal mesh op top. I wouldn’t call them terrible; there’s definitely worse gibbon enclosures out there. But neither would I call them good. Walking around the gibbon enclosures, I found additional outdoor enclosures for the gorilla’s. They were ugly and quite small, but since the gorilla’s also have a larger, more beautiful outdoor enclosure, it’s not much of an issue.

Anyway, the entire gorilla building just didn’t meet the high expecations I had of the zoo. Again, nothing about it is terrible; but it is quite mediocre compared to the rest of the zoo I’d seen so far.

Now that I had seen the gorilla house, I decided it was time to visit the Manatee House, one of the things about this zoo I was looking forward to the most!
 
Tiergarten Nürnberg. 15-04-2024.
PART 2

Before entering the Manatee House, I took a quick look at the sea lion lagoon; a much larger, deeper and more natural looking sea lion enclosure than the one I saw in Heidelberg. All of the sea lions were swimming; I didn’t see any on land.

I entered the Manatee House and was immediately greeted by the humidity and lushness of a tropical house. I usually love tropical houses in zoos, especially ones with free-roaming species. The one in Nürnberg is especially beautiful though, and does a good job of immersing the visitors into the rainforest setting. The fact that I visited the zoo on a quiet day really added tot he experience; there were barely any other people here.

The Manatee House mostly consists of a single, one-way route throughout the building, with several points of interest along the way, including a small elevated observation hut, bird feeders and of course multiple vantage points into the water area.

The best thing about the Manatee Haus is the fact there’s animals everywhere; beneath you in the water, all around you in the plants and trees, and flying above you. There are mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fishes and insects; it’s like a complete zoo within a single building!

Nürnberg’s Manatee Haus focuses on South America; therefor, all the species displayed here are from that continent. The manatees obviously are the headliner. A species beloved by many, including myself. It’s a true pleasure to watch these animals suddenly surface right in front of you for a breath of air, only to submerge again after. The water in the manatee house is very clear and you’re able to see the manatees even when they’re at the bottom of their pool, but it’s definitely worth waiting for them to get to the surface as it provides you with excellent views of them!

The pools of the manatee house are home to more than just the manatees; the pacu’s are impossible to miss, and I also spotted a few cichlids and catfishes. The yellow-spotted turtles were easily to find, but I failed to see the mata-mata.

Besides the manatee, the building is home to two more species of mammals. Despite their nocturnal tendecies, the Pallas' long-tongued bats were actively flying around the hall, mostly around the bird feeders to snatch a quick bite.

The white-faced saki monkeys were also easy to find, and it was obvious their favorite spot was in the back of the hall, near the exit.

In addition to the turtles, the reptiles are represented by 3 species of free-roaming lizards; green iguana, yellow-headed gecko and Martinique anole. With some effort I managed to find an iguana near the water (or at least, its tail and hind legs) but I was unsuccesful in finding the smaller species.

There’s frogs in the building as well; no less than 4* species live here. I’m not surprised I didn’t spot any of the 3 tree frog species, but I did manage to find multiple Anthony’s poison frogs hopping around.
* 6 species are signed, but ZTL tells me 2 of them are no longer there.

No tropical house would be complete without some free-flying birds. There’s a total of 7* species living in the Manatee house. The Peruvian ground-doves were very noisy and easy to spot, which was good news as they were a new species for me! I also had very little trouble spotting the turqoise tanagers, as there was a small group of them conspicuously flying around. I also managed to spot the other small passerines; red-legged honeycreeper, paradise tanager and violaceous euphonia. The final two birds species are ducks; lesser Brazilian teal and red shoveler, both of which were very easy to find on the water.
* 8 species are signed, but the lake ducks are no longer kept

The leaf-cutter ants have an enclosure that consists of multiple 'rooms' with one of them being an open-topped island enclosure. Finally, there’s a bunch of butterflies flying around, but I didn’t see a lot of them.

I could have easily spent more time in the Manatee House, but as there was lots more to see, I had to go on eventually. However, I still wasn’t quite done with the building just yet, as the next stop on the route was the ‘Blue Lagoon’

The Blue Lagoon is a subterranean hallway which has the viewing panels into both the manatee pool and the dolphin pool. As it was very quiet here as well, I took the opportunity to get off my feet for a bit, sit down and enjoy the underwater viewing into the U-shaped manatee pool, complete with flooded forest theming. The large windows and crystal clear water provide excellent observation of these amazing creatures, as well as the fishes. I was also glad to spot the mata-mata here; it was swimming around above the bottom in the deepest part of the pool. I think I’ve only seen mata-mata’s in small, shallow enclosures before, so seeing one actively swim around was a cool, new experience, and I wish more zoos would give mata-mata’s the opportunity to actually move around!

Nürnberg is the 7th zoo I’ve been to with manatees, after Burgers’ Zoo, Berlin Tierpark (which no longer keeps them), Duisburg, Paris, Wroclaw and Faunia (Madrid). After visiting Nürnberg, I have an even harder time deciding which manatee house/enclosure I liked best (obviously not Berlin), but Nürnberg is for sure in the top 3.

I didn’t spend much time at the dolphin pool as I’m not a fan of cetaceans in captivity. But I do have to give the zoo credit for being the second best dolphin enclosure I’ve seen, after Hardewijk’s Lagune. It’s pretty deep, and much more natural looking than most other dolphin enclosures, like Duisburg’s. There’s rocks in the enclosure which provided the dolphins with some enrichment, and they also seemed to enjoy the fake kelp. It’s also an outdoor enclosure, which means the dolphins get to enjoy the weather conditions and natural sunlight.

I left the manatees and dolphins behind me and headed to what was probably going to be another highlight of the zoo; the Desert House.

The Desert House is located next to a few enclosures for hoofstock; I saw Somali wild asses on my right, Dybowski deers on my left. I decided to leave those for later and head straight the Desert House. The outside of building itself doesn’t look very ‘desert-y’. I wouldn’t have been able to tell the theme of this building if there weren’t a big replica of a dung beetle in front of the entrance! First, I checked the outdoor enclosures for the striped weasels. Two large (considering the size of the species), nicely decorated enclosures are located on the right side of the building. Of course, there were no weasels to be seen. Has anyone ever seen any weasels here?

The Desert House itself consists of one medium sized walk-through enclosure. A one-way visitor path takes you from the entrance to the exit, while all around you there’s sand, rocks, desert foliage and of course, animals. It looks absolutely fantastic! The idea of a walk-through desert house is so much more original than a tropical rainforst (although I will always love those too) and it’s great to see the execution is even better than the idea. The building is small enough for people to get good views of the animals, but big enough for the animals to have opportunities to retreat. The lighting in the building is phenominal. It had started to rain at this point, but it was barely noticable from inside the building at all.

None of the animals in this building are ‘crowd pleasures’ or big names. Instead, it introduces the public to species most of them have never even heard of. The building is themed after arid northern Africa and Arabia, and houses animals native to this part of the world.

Only two mammals call the desert house home; the fat sand rat (one of the best animal names out there!) and the round-eared elephant shrew. During my first visit tot he building, the rats were everywhere. Running around, digging, peek-a-boo-ing from their burrows. There were amazing to observe and didn’t seem shy around visitors, even crossing the visitor path right in front of me.

I initially didn’t see the elephant shrews, but I revisited the building later that day, and I saw two of them, casually wandering around and eating from their food bowls.

Birds are represented here by three species; Red-billed firefinch, red-cheeked cordon-bleu and trumpeter finch. Tiergarten Nürnberg is the only zoo worldwide to keep the latter species! All three species were very active and easy to see, and therefor I was able to add the trumpeter finch to my list as a new species! A lot of the birds were collecting nesting material, which was awesome to observe.

Unfortunately, the reptile collection has been quite thinned out in recent years. European chameleon, Yellow fan-fingered gecko, Bosk's fringe-toed lizard, Eyed dabb lizard and Atlas agama, all pretty rare species in zoos, have all left the collection (although some of them are still signed). Only three species are left. The most recognizable are the Egyptian tortoises, which I observed doing absolutely nothing. The most numerous one is by far the black hardun, which were all around the building, mostly basking on the rocks. The rarest is the Sinai agama, as this is their only holding outside of Arabia. Luckily, I did manage to find one as this was another new species.

Lastly, the signage mentioned no less then three species of (dung) beetles. I saw the dung, but no matter how hard I looked, couldn’t find any beetles whatsover. It was quite disappointing as dung beetles are quite a rare sight in zoos.

Overall, the Desert House was really good! I wish I could have visited earlier in time, when more species were present, but even with a smaller species line-up this building is a memorable, unique animal house that absolutely deserves the praise it gets!

Upon exiting the Desert House, it was still raining. I shortly visited the bharals next, who have a really good, natural looking enclosure. (This enclosure was marked as ‘takin’ on the map. I suspect the animals were switched around, as the opposite was true as well). Before heading into the next part of the zoo I hadn’t visited yet, I decided to backtrack to the giraffe house first to get another go at seeing the striped weasels. I made my way back there and first checked the large (main) weasel enclosure. Outside, nothing. Inside, nothing. The smaller ‘pet store’ cages seemed quiet as well, but then I noticed slight ‘digging’ sounds coming from one of the next boxes in one of the cages. And sure enough, after half a minute, a striped weasel emerged from its next box, only to immediately disappear into another! Over the course of the next 10 minutes, this happened a few times. One time the weasel even stayed out for 10 seconds at the time, finally giving me the opportunity to snap something that at least resemples a picture of it. And to make thing even better, I even got a very quick glimps of one of the weasels offspring! (It came out of it box, and disappeared into another, but never showed itself a second time). After the weasel stopped showing itself for 2 minutes straight, and all sounds had ceased as well, I decided to finally return to see the rest of the zoo. At this point in time, it was 11.15 and I still had A LOT to see!

(I also want to make a special mention of Lucy, the zoo cat who lives in the Giraffe House and who is very, very cute!)
 
You had a very lucky run with the weasels. When I went to Nürnberg a few weeks before your visit I only saw one weasel peek out from its nest box before I had the chance to take a picture since there were also guests around. The poor animal got scared and hid back by the time I had the chance to take a shot. I did not see any other weasel on mi visit to the desert house and my return to the giraffe house. I did see the food get depleted with every visit so the weasels must have been active.
 
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Yes, the same thing happened on my visit. Because of the rains, more and more people went to seek shelter in the giraffe house. When a group of kids got in, the weasel had enough and stopped showing itself.

It's not the first and it won't be the last time other zoo visitors 'ruin' an experience.

At least I saw them.

(Third attempt before leaving the zoo was unsuccesful)
 
Consider yourself very lucky for the sighting of the weasels. I visit the Tiergarten almost every month and have only seen them four times: Two times in their enclosures at the Desert House and two times in the temporary cages, never in their main enclosure in the Giraffe House.


As for your experience in the Desert House: Yes, the reptile diversity has been higher before. But it is not as bad as in your report and will get a lot better soon: Last year Spiny-tailed Lizards had their return to the house with a single adult that is still holding strong against the harduns. Waiting to move in are Arabian Chameleons that were behind the scenes but visible through the small window at the entrance when I visited early April. So sorry to say, but you missed a glimpse at the only zoo-holding in the world and definitely need to come back when they are on show. The dung beetles aren’t always on display because they need to be flown in from Africa regularly until the Tiergarten achieves to breed them (Which is, what this house and the complicated technic inside the sand is all about. They say they are now close to this world-first.). Some days ago, 700 dung beetles together with darkling beetles and tiger beetles were released inside the house.


The bharals moved into their enclosure only recently after yearlong renovation finished. In the future, the takins will move down to them so renovation of their enclosure can start. When this is finished (hopefully it won’t take as long as the bharals), both enclosures can be connected and shared by both species.


Thank you for your extensive report. Its always very interesting to read reports on the Tiergarten from zoo-nerds that aren’t used to the Nürnberg way of zoo-things like I am.
 
Thanks for your comment!

Yes I realize I got lucky with the weasels! I was going in with the expectation of not seeing them, so I was very pleasantly surprised!

Glad to read the Desert House is going to get new species, especially the chameleons!

Yes, I figured the dung beetles wouldn't be on display permanantly. They don't exactly have long life spans.

Nürnberg is for sure a zoo I'd like to visit again. Perhaps in a few years. For next year I'm currently considering eastern Germany (Dresden, Cottbus, Chemnitz. Maybe Erfurt or Aschersleben, perhaps a revisit to Madgeburg or Leipzig.)
I wish I had the opportunity to do a second zootrip this year, but alas.. So much to see, so little time.
 
Tiergarten Nürnberg. 15-04-2024.
PART 3

I made my way from the Giraffe House to the yet unvisited part of the zoo, arriving at the ibex enclosure first. (at this point, the rains had stopped) Tierpark Nürnberg would have the first of many excellent ibex enclosures of this trip. The ibex enclosure is one of the many where the zoo takes full advantage of the natural landscape. The ibexes have plenty of space to roam and climb in their very rocky habitat.

From the ibex enclosures I had a lot of different directions to go. I decided to take the most outer path first (the upper path on the map). Now would be the perfect time to mention how beautiful the zoo grounds are. Even without any enclosures or animals, this would be a very pleasant walk. The path I took is the highest point of the zoo; from it, you can see some of the enclosures in the lower part of the zoo, like the maned wolf and the lions. I would of course come back to those later.

The first enclosures I came across on this paths, are some aviaries. From here you get a top view into the large waterfowl aviary, which has the entrance on the ground level on another path. On the same level as the upper path, bordering the large aviary is a smaller, but still very spacious, aviary for Eurasian hawk owls (previously great grey owl).

I continued my walk until I reached the tapir house. Here I would find two basic (but not bad) outdoor enclosures; one for Malayan tapirs, the other for babirussas. I really like both of those species, especially the babirussa. However, it was apparantly too cold for either species as unfortunately neither was to be seen outside. I went inside the building and did find the tapirs in their indoor enclosure.

On the other side of the building, there’s the indoor enclosure for the babirussa. Very small, very old and ugly. I did not see any babirussa here either; they must have been in the off-show part of their indoor enclosure.

The tapir house is obviously quite an old building; actually, it is the former manatee house and there’s a third enclosure that consist mostly of water complete with underwater viewing; the former manatee pool. Quite shocking to realize this small, old pond used to house these gigantic animals. I’m so glad they now have a much better enclosure in the Manatee House.

The former manatee pond isn’t completely empty these days; I saw a few barb-like fishes in the water, and two Philippine ducks on the land part (a new species since ZTL didn’t mention them yet). A net has been placed between the ducks and the visitors to keep them from leaving the enclosure. I suspect more animal species might be added at a later date; I remember reading something about turtles.
The tapir house also has a terrarium for crocodile lizards. It was a beautiful terrarium, but I didn't immediately see the lizard and I didn't want to take up too much time looking for it.

Not seeing any babirussa’s was a slight disappointment, but it was time to move on to the next zoological rarity. Before that though, I passed the lynx enclosure. It’s huge and very natural looking. Basically, it’s just a large fenced off plot of forest. From this path, you have a great top view into the enclosure, and I did manage to get a decent view of a lynx sitting on a rock. This was another really great enclosure!

Next up; the birds of prey aviaries. I’m not usually the biggest fan of seeing raptors in zoos; they often get enclosures that do not give them the possibilty to really spread their wings and fly (hopping from one branch to another doesn’t really qualify as flying)
So when I saw the first aviary, the bearded vulture one, I was happy to see this one was really good. It was definitely large enough, and it's a very green, natural habitat that blends in really well with the surrounding area. This top view wasn’t be best for actually seeing the vultures, but there’s more to the enclosure later.


The other birds of prey aviaries were less impressive, and could be described as pretty standard. The first species I saw here is the Andean condor. They have two connected quite large octagon-shaped aviaries (it’s not unlikely they were seperate enclosures at some point) . However, due to condors being absolutely massive creatures, I still feel like the aviaries were on the small side for this particular species.

The second enclosure was a similar, although single octagon-shaped aviary for a juvenile condor (previously Stellers sea eagle?) and the same applies to the third one for the coolest bird-of-prey of them all; the harpy eagle!

The harpy enclosure is not terrible, but not really good either. If only the harpy would have an enclosure similar to the one the bearded vultures have; that would be soo cool. Despite the enclosure not measuring up to the standard of the rest of the zoo, I really enjoyed seeing this amazing species again!

The final aviary was smaller, but also kept a much smaller species; ural owl. Like the condor aviaries, this one also seemed to me to have been two aviaries previously, that were later connected to make one larger one.

The path then takes you back to the bearded vulture enclosure, but this time at the ground level. The aviary is walk-in, and from the visitor path inside I had much better views of the vultures. Besides the vultures, this aviary is home to three other species; a couple of black storks, a group of rock pigeons and a non-bird; the alpine marmot. I only saw one marmot, but there were plenty of hiding places so there could have defenitely been more! (this aviary has housed other species in the past, like Alpine rock partridge and red-billed chough)

My plan was to walk from here towards the Zoo Restaurant ‘Waldschänke’ and the nearby enclosures for polar animals. However, the path was blocked due to construction works. The cheetah enclosure was reachable, but from there I had to backtrack a small bit. Like the lynx, the cheetah also has a very nice enclosure. More open and less foresty, but still with plenty of natural vegetation and rockwork. And again, really spacious. Due to the rerouting, I decided that instead of going to the polar area, I’d go visit the predator section of the zoo first and visit the other cat species and martens first.

First I passed the fantastic lynx enclosure again, this time at ground level. The next cat on this row of feline enclosures is the Siberian tiger. Unfortunately, I did not love the enclosure. Like most other enclosures at this zoo, it looks natural with plenty of cover and shade, an amazing rock backddrop and no barriers as they tiger is seperated from the people by a moat of water. But that same moat also really limits the space of the enclosure though, and therefor I have to say I think it is too small.


After seeing the outdoor enclosure for the tiger, I went inside the carnivore house to see their indoor enclosures, as well as the indoor enclosure for the lions. The carnivore house is really cool and iconic; it is carved out in the rock formations! A rocky tunnel leads to a dome, where visitors stand in the middle, surrounded by the indoor enclosures for the big cats! The visitor area is dominated by stone and quite dark, but the enclosures themselves are much more themed with natural looking rockwork, with sunlight coming from the roof. Beautiful! (Also, for some reason there are a few bulbuls free-roaming in the building).


Both the tiger and the lions were not indoors, so I went out again to find the lions in their outdoor enclosure. I liked the lion enclosure a lot more than I did the one for the tiger. In a lot of ways they are similar; the lion enclosure also has a moat of water, lots of vegetation and the beautiful rock formations as its backdrop. Importantly though, the lion enclosure is bigger, around double the size. When I arrived at the enclosure I saw four lions – one male, one female and two juveniles – resting in the shade of the rocks. But then one by one they emerged and they moved to the middle part of the enclosure, giving me excellent views and some really nice photo opportunities! A really nice moment, especially since the sun was shining its brightest right now!


The last feline is this area (but not the last carnivore) is the fishing cat. Their enclosure is another one I really like! I think it’s the first open-topped enclosure for his species that I have seen. Like the big cats, the fishing cats are kept behind a moat as well, so no glass or mesh barriers! It’s getting repetitive, but again this is a very lush, natural enclosure with a lot of space, cover and climbing opportunities fort he cats, and even swimming opportunities if they cats would wish to do so. The indoor enclosure for the fishing cats is visible, but visitors can only view it from a small distance and can not actually get to it. Still, because of the glass panels the cats can somewhat be viewed when there are indoors, but the angle is not the best. I could tell that the indoor enclosure was very well planted indoors, and I even saw a small stream of flowing water! Yes, the fishing cat enclosure in Nürnberg is probably the best I’ve seen for this species. The cats initially were inside (I could see them walking around through the glass) but not much later they went outside, again providing me with some really great photo opportunities! Great stuff, I love this zoo!


Before getting to the last 2 carnivores in this area, I came across the large waterbird aviary I had previously seen from the upper path. From the ground level there’s actually an opportunity to enter the aviary, as it is walkthrough. The aviary is large, high and lush; another superb enclosure. I did not see a whole bunch of species; a group of spoonbills, some waldrapp ibisses, and a single grey-headed swamphen. (From inside the aviary you can also see the hawk-owl aviary from the backside, which is a nice piece of zoo design.)


The maned wolf enclosure was next. A spacious and natural green paddock that was quite simple yet very effective. When I arrived at the enclosure, I saw a single very active maned wolf, another species that I really like.


Finally, I arrived at the enclosure for yellow-throated marten. This enclosure has been getting a lot of aclaim on zoochat, and I was so glad to finally see it for myself. Most zoos that have martens, wether it’s this species or another, keep them in cages of various sizes, sometimes terribly small (BestZoo, I’m looking at you. Shame!). Tierpark Nürnberg does things differently though, and provide the martens with a lot of ground space, flowing water, lots of cover, and plenty of climbing opportunities, including large live trees! The enclosure has different viewing points, and if there martens are active, provides excellent views of the animals. I was in luck as I saw two martens being very active! I didn’t see them climb any of the large trees, but I still really enjoyed seeing these amazing creatures transverse their entire habitat. I’ve never seen captive martens like this before! (Coincedentally I saw yellow-throated in the wild in Thailand just a few months before my visit to Nürnberg, which made me love the species even more than I already did)


Overall, this entire area was fantastic. The fishing cats and martens were a highlight, but I also really enjoyed the lions and maned wolf. The cat enclosures, aviary and carnivore house are all great displays of zoo design. If only the tiger enclosure had more space to it… but I guess every zoo has to have its flaws.
 
The lynx enclosure is indeed a marvelous one. On my visit I was basically eye-to-eye with one sitting on a tree. Nürnberg does a really good job utilizing its sloped location using elevated paths.

I also loved the inclusion of the bulbuls in en exhibit dedicated to animals that otherwise don’t charm me.
 
Tiergarten Nürnberg. 15-04-2024.
PART 4

From the marten enclosure, I decided to go to the snow leopards next, but that path was obstructed due to construction works. I was able to view the takin enclosure and the enclosure for nilgai and blackbuck, but I couldn’t walk any further, meaning I had to turn around. I took another path that took me back to the lynx enclosure, and then a very nice enclosure for barbary sheep. Next up are the red panda’s. Their enclosure is quite spacious, especially because of the lenght of the enclosre, and has a lot of high trees for the animals to climb on. There are paths on either side of the enclosure; the path that I was on was now was higher up, providing a good view into the enclosure. If I would have continued this path, it would have taken me directly to polar animals. However I decided to take a small stairs down and ended up at the lower path, giving me the another vantage point of the red panda enclosure. The indoor enclosure is also viewable to the public, and I saw a red panda using both the indoor and outdoor enclosure.


The main reason I went down the stairs is because I had now ended up at the other end of the path that was obstruced earlier. I decided to walk it in opposite direction and see how far it would get me. First though, immediately across from the red panda’s, was an enclosure for Indian rhinoceros and Visayan warty pigs that you could walk around in its entirety. t’s a pretty spacious enclosure, surrounded by a lot of greenery. I didn’t see any rhino however, but there were plenty of pigs in this enclosure.

Next up was an enclosure for water buffalo; a really nicely designed enclosure, however quite limited in space. There was a land part and lots of water, with a small sandy island in the shallow part of the water. I saw two buffalos lying in the sand on this island.

I was happy to find I was able to continue a bit further, right up until the enclosures for wisent and snow leopards. The wisent enclosure was a simple, sandy paddock surrounded by lots of trees. But I was much more interested in the snow leopards, a species that I always enjoy to see. The enclosure did not disappoint; It was spacious and had lots of natural rockwork and vegetation. I was happy to the snow leopard active; I’ve been really lucky with the carnivores this day!

Across from the wisents were constructions works going on, which was the reason for the obstructed path; the former wapiti enclosure was now being refurbished for Asian hoofstock, but the signage did not specify any species. (There’s already quite a few species Asian hoofstock in the zoo. I’m hoping the new species will be anoa. I think it would fit really well here!)

The construction works ment the enclosure for Visaya spotted deer was unreachable at the moment.

I backtracked from the snow leopards to the red panda enclosure and walk a bit further to find the simple yet spacious enclosure for Grevy’s zebras on my right hand. On my left hand was a really good enclosure for beavers, with some really nice height differences and two pools, one of which having underwater viewing. I did not however see any beavers, nor did I see any ground squirrels that also inhabit this enclosure. A window that (I assume) looks into their indoor area was boarded up, and therefor the beavers were not visible at all. I walked up the path and reached yet another really good enclosure; a very spacious and lush enclosure for Eurasian otters, of course also with underwater viewing. A portion of the indoor enclosure is viewable. I did see the other here, it almost went ouside (it stuck its head through the opening) but decided not to and went to go asleep.
Both the beaver and otter enclosures were fantastic and I would have loved to see the beavers and otters actually use it, but I can’t always be lucky. From the otters, I walked towards the Humboldt penguins, passing under a bridge (this bridge is the path I’ve would have taken if I went straight ahead from the red panda’s instead of taking a strairs down, and from which I would have seen the penguin enclosure from above) and right to the underwater. From this angle I couldn’t really see the land part of the penguins, but luckily there were a few penguins swimming right in front of the windows. They had a lot of space to do so!

Next up was more underwater viewing, this time for the polar bear. I continued the upwards sloping path and reached the polar bear enclosures. There are two enclosures for this species, and I really like the larger one; it’s spacious, and has a lots of rocks, logs, grass and trees in it as well as a large moat of water for the bears to swim in. The smaller enclosure is quite natural looking as well, with plenty of water, but it’s land space is limited. I saw one bear in the smaller enclosure and two in the large one, and all three bears were very active.

Next to the polar bear enclosures is a second sea lion enclosure; this one has the classical ‘seal pool’ design, but with natural rocks and foliage instead of the usual concrete or mock rocks. It is also larger than most similar enclosures. In addition to the Californian sea lions, common seals live in this enclosure too.

The path from the polar bears/seals towards the ‘Waldschänke’ restaurant was blocked off as well, meaning the restaurant was not currently reachable.


After the polar section, I took the path towards the childrens zoo, where I wanted to grab something to eat. Along the way, I encountered four hoofstock enclosures. Firstly , a basic but very spacious enclosure for Przewalski’s wild horses. Secondly a wooded enclosure for red duiker and Stanley’s crane. Lastly two enclosures that were very similar to the one for the wild horses, one for American bisons and the other for camels and kulans.


I decided to skip the petting zoo area including the guanaco’s, and headed towards the savannah enclosure. The savannah is a huge, grassy paddock for elands, Grants zebra’s (which I somehow didn’t see) and ostriches. Next to that is a smaller, but still large paddock for Cape buffaloes, with plenty of shade because of the large fenced off patch of trees in the middle of the enclosure.

The former goitered gazelle enclosure had recently been transformed into an enclosure for Chacoan peccaries. This must have been the largest peccary enclosure I’ve seen; it seemed to be even larger than the part I could see from here because I saw a passage to another area in the back.


Next up was the enclosure signed as ‘Rhinoceros/warty pigs’, the second enclosure for Indian rhinoceros. It consists of two parts, connected by a simple shelter building that can also be used as an indoor enclosure in case both parts are seperated. Both parts are adequate to house rhino’s; I especially liked the first enclosure I came across, as it had some nice height differences. I didn’t see a rhino there, as the only rhino I saw here was currently in the other enclosure (left enclosure on the map). Despite being signed on the map, I didn’t see any warty pigs here (they were in the other rhino enclosure I mentioned previously, ironically not signed on the map)


After the rhino’s I had the choice of continuing this path straight ahead, or take a path down between the two large lakes at the bottom part of the zoo. I decided to do the former, but then backtrack and do the latter as well. I passed a simply aviary for snowy owls and a simple paddock for Highland cattle, and arrived at the yellow-backed duiker enclosure. This is another species I really love and was looking forward to seeing again. There seemed to be two paddocks for this species; one main enclosure next to the path, and a second one in the back, behind the Highland cattle enclosure. Luckily the duiker was in the first enclosure, since it would have been poorly visible in the second (perhaps there was a duiker in there as well, in which case I didn’t see it). There is also viewing into the stables for the duikers.


Continuing this path would take me back tot he Dybowksi deer and bharals, so

I backtracked a bit and took the path between the two lakes to the most lower part of the zoo (the most southern part of the map). The lakes are inhabitated by waterfowl, of which some are wild and some are captive, although I wasn’t always able to tell which were which in case of the ducks and cormorants. The lake on my left (right on the map) seemed to be just that, so I decided not to take the path along this lake back to the petting zoo, but turn right instead and walk in the other direction, towards the Desert House. On this lake, the flamingo’s have their own seperate area, including an indoor enclosure that cannot be visited by zoo guests. A lot of the birds have access to pretty much the entire lake, but were all hanging out in the same spot, close to the visitor path. Species I saw here include bar-headed goose, crested screamer, white stork, Dalmatian pelican and great white pelican.


On the other side of the path is the track for the miniature railway train. This train has two stations, one near the meerkats, and one at the petting zoo, and is a good way to get from one end of the zoo to another without the need to talk. (Not sure if the train was in use that day; I did hear it at one point, but I never saw it) What’s interesting to me is that behind the railway are a couple of animal enclosures, which means you can only few them from a distance since the track is between you. Two of these enclosure house cranes; white-naped and red-crowned. The third one, the one in the middle, has a species I really wanted to see as I’ve only seen it two times before; the musk deer. Unfortunately though, I was not able to find any. It’s pretty frustrating a rare species like this is kept in an enclosure that you can’t really look into all that well.


From here , I finally reached the last enclosures of the zoo; those for addaxes and Somali wild asses (the latter of which I had already glimped into from the desert house). These two enclosures are located behind the tracks as well; however, there’s a railway crossing here so you can actually get to the enclosures. I especially liked the area in front of the addax enclosure; even though it is surrounded by greenery, it did manage to bring out the desert theme due to a good use of sand and desert-looking rocks.
 
Thank you for these wonderful reviews, @ralph! I have greatly enjoyed reading your accounts of Heidelberg and Nurnberg, and I am very much looking forward to those yet to come! This is especially true as someone currently planning their own trip to this region (and further abroad) -- your accounts of Nurnberg have definitely helped cement it as a "must-see" for my own itinerary.
 
You're welcome! I'm glad these have been helpful to you!

Nurnberg was awesome and it is now in my top 5 zoos all time.

As for the others, I'd say Hellabrunn/Munich and Innsbruck are also must-see zoos and I would recommend them for your initerary. Augsburg not so much although this zoo still has its own strenghts. Salzburg is beautiful but small, but combined with the museum (or the Welt of Gifte which I didn't visit) still makes for a great day.

Reviews for all of these will come at a later date. Next up will be Munich!
 
I just realized the last paragraph didn't get copy/pasted, so here it is;

Tiergarten Nürnberg. 15-04-2024.
PART 4 1/4

By this time it was almost time for me to wrap up my visit to this zoo. I decided to spend the last minutes revisiting the Desert House and Manatee House. It was not until I reached the exit that I remembered I skipped the Naturkundehaus. Unfortunately, I had to go because again I had a train to catch, so I missed out on this building entirely. Dumb mistake.

Zoo Nürnberg was awesome, but it was time to leave the zoo and the city behind and get to my next destination: Munich!

And let's get right to it!

DAY 3. Tierpark Hellabrunn, Munich. 16-04-2024.
PART 1

Unlike Heidelberg and Nürnberg, I was staying multiple days and nights in Munich. From here, I planned to visit Salzburg and Augsburg as day trips, and of course Tierpark Hellabrunn. I hadn’t decided an order yet; it was going to depent on the weather. The forecast predicted the 16th was going to be the best day, and since the zoo in Munich was the highest on my priority list, I opted to visit that one first. Salzburg would be visited on the fourth day, and lastly Augsburg would be visited on day 5.

The zoo in Munich was the largest and most famous of all the German zoos I had not yet visited, so it had been on my wishlist for quite some time. It only took 2 metro rides from my hotel to get there, and since I was sleeping in Munich that night it finally ment having a day without trains, or having to leave early to catch one! The walk from the metro station to the zoo entrance is a short but pleasant one as you cross bridge over a river (the Isar) that’s home to a lot of waterfowl, including some red-crested pochards (not sure if these are truly wild, or if they’re somehow part of the zoo collection)

After passing the modest entrance building, I immediately encountered the first animals; a large, wooded enclosure for Persian fallow deer that you can alsmost completely walk around. From here, I had to choose between going left or right; I chose to go right as that would take me to a main target species for that day; the Apennine chamois, the only ones of their subspecies in Europe. Immediately after the entrance is a restaurant building that looks looks out over a small body of water, and the walkthrough petting zoo for domesticated goats. A small bit further are some very basic enclosures for domesticed pigs. Next up was the large and natural enclosure for the chamois and alpine marmots. Or at least, it used to be until recently. I pretty much immediately spotted a couple of marmots, but did not see any chamois, and neither did I see any signage. Because I also didn’t see them during a second attempt, I enquired with a zookeeper, who confirmed the last chamois had died. A real bummer, and missing out on my main target species was not a great way to start the day.

Across from the chamois enclosure is a simple building called the ‘Mouse House’ that ofcourse keeps domesticated mice (It was ok, but I liked the one in Heidelberg more). A bit further is a simple enclosure for great white pelicans.

One of the newest enclosures in the zoo is the lion enclosure, which opened in mai 2022. I quite like it. The enclosure looks natural with a nice rock backdrop and lots of greenery, logs and rocks. There are multiple viewing points into the enclosure. A water moat seperates a large part of the enclosure from the visitors, but there as glass viewing panels on the other side of the enclosure that allowes the lions and the people to get very close to each other. I saw some very active lions (two males) that indeed came to the windows. The indoor enclosure is viewable as well and is one of the better indoor enclosures for lions I’ve seen. The visitor area is dominated by mock rock, wood and foliage and is nicely done.

Across from the lion enclosure are the alpine ibexes. This is a very pretty enclose; some foliage and a moat seperates visitor from the ibexes, providing great barrier-free looks. The enclosure itself consists mostly of rocks and boulders, with some greenery thrown in, with trees as its backdrop. It is not as impressive as the ibex inclose in Nürnberg, but still a very good one.

The ibex enclosure is the first of a number of hoofstock enclosures that dominate the southern part of the zoo (when looking at the map). The next ungulates I encountered was a small group (I counted 4) of Eurasian moose (elk) in a large, grassy enclosure. Across from them is a currently empty enclosure that I assume previously kept markhors.

Further along this path you will find the rhino house on one side, and an enclosure for Asian ungulates on the other. The latter is a large, grassy paddock for nilgai, blackbuck and axis deer seperated from the public by a moat. The rhino house is an old looking building with some glass and a lot of concrete, both outside and inside. In the rhino house, you can (obviously) find two indoor enclosures for Indian rhinoceros as well as one for Visayan warty pig, who do not share an enclosure with the rhino’s here. The zoo tried to use some wooden logs and a natural substrate to make the enclosures look a bit more appealing, but in the end, this whole building is an ugly, concrete disaster. The rhino's have very limited space here; they barely have room to turn around. The building defenitely holds some value from a zoohistorical point however.
There is actually a third species living in the rhino house; two-toed sloths. In the middle of the building is a single tree, from which different ropes and latters fan out to different points in the building for the sloths to climb on.

The rhino house is surrounded by the outdoor enclosures for the rhino’s and warty pigs. There are two rhino enclosures which seemed to be currently connected to create one larger one. I did see only one rhino, which was using the pool in the smaller enclosure.
The enclosure for the pigs looked like it used to house rhino’s at some point; therefor, it was quite spacious for the much smaller pigs. I eventually found the pigs burried between some hay in wooden shelter.

Four more hoofstock enclosures finish up this part of the zoo; on my left side, I came across yaks first, followed kiangs, both in very decent typical moated hoofstock enclosures. On my right side I failed to see any Reeve’s muntjacs, as well as any Mishmi takins as the latter were currently behind the scenes due to ongoing constructions works their enclosure. Luckily I saw this (sub)species the day before in Nürnberg!

Tierpark Hellabrunn has two Petting Zoo areas and right now I had arrived at the second one, ‘Mühlendorf’, which is larger than the first one. Obviously, this area houses various domesticated animals in a barnyard setting. Goats, cattle, ponies, guinea pigs… the usual suspects. A nearby lake has a hanging brigde going over it that was currently out of use.

Besides domestics, this area is also home to a few wild animals of the cold-blooded variety. Two open-topped outdoor terraria house native reptiles and amphibians; one for vipers, which was currently empty, and one for common toads and Western green lizards (not seen).

A small building known as the ‘Fischburthaus’ focuses on native fishes and amphibians. The largest of the two rooms features a couple of tanks for graylings and a single brown trout. Although I appreciated the educational aspect of this room, it was pretty underwhelming from a visitor perspective, mostly because there were barely any fishes to be seen; some tanks were empty.

The smaller of two rooms has a collection of smaller tanks and enclosures. One aquarium has sunbleak and gudgeon (which might be new species as they were not listed on ZTL), a second has bitterling, three-spined stickleback and crayfish. There were also terraria for fire salamander, green toad (not seen) and alpine newt (not seen)+yellow-bellied toad.

Tierpark Hellabrunn borders the Isar River. A small ‘tributary’ of the Isar runs right across the zoo, practically dividing it in 2 parts, with bridges connecting them. After visiting the Fischbruthaus, I crossed this stream to the upper part of the zoo. I had now arriverd at the eastern corner of the zoo, which is named ‘Polarwelt’ and as its name suggests, is home to animals from the colder parts of the world.
 
Hellabrunn is an interesting zoo, but it seems that their hoofstock collection, once their big selling point, is ever so slowly dwindling.

ralph said:
The enclosure for the pigs looked like it used to house rhino’s at some point; therefor, it was quite spacious for the much smaller pigs. I eventually found the pigs burried between some hay in wooden shelter.
Click to expand...

These pigs inhabit the former bearded pig and Malayan tapir enclosures.
 
DAY 3. Tierpark Hellabrunn, Munich. 16-04-2024.

PART 2

The main attraction in ‘Polarwelt’ are the polar bears; I was afraid I’d find an outdated and crappy enclosure here, as polar bears often get shafted in zoos, but I was pleasantly surprised when I stumbled upon the polar bear enclosure. What I saw was a spacious enclosure with grass, live trees, rocks and height differences, surrounded by a moat of water and large glass viewing panels. I didn’t see any polar bears here though, but that was because all three of them were currently hanging out in the second enclosure. This one was smaller, and had more concrete in addition to the rockwork instead of vegetation, but there was some natural substrate in here as well. In addition to the main moat, there is also a smaller pool with a small underwater viewing windows. Overall, the polar bear enclosures did not disappoint. Both of them combined offer the bears quite some space, and even though there’s some concrete, there’s plenty of natural ground as well. I will admit they are not the prettiest enclosures, and all viewing opportunities are the large glass panels which is a shame, but I have defenitely seen worse.

On the other side of the polar bears are the enclosures for arctic foxes and snowy owls (and previously arctic hares, but unfortunately the last one had died). The Arctic fox enclosure is fantastic! It can be viewed from the main path, but the visitors can also enter a small cave/hut that leads to a slightly elevated path which gives addition viewing into this large and natural enclosure. The path also goes through the beautiful looking snowy owl enclosure, which can also be seen from outside through some wire mesh.

Also in this area is the sea lion enclosure, which is basic and typical for the species. Not bad, not great.
Lastly, there is an enclosure here for 2 species subantartic penguins; king and rockhopper. The enclosure itself is ofcourse an indoor enclosure, but it’s not actually inside of a building as the visitor area is outdoors (but covered). I could not get a good look at this enclosure as it was being refurbished, and the penguins were off-show, but what from I could see it didn’t look impressive.

I continued my walk-through of the zoo and came across a seemingly empty savannah enclosure; again, the zoo was doing constructions works here, but it looked like an almost-finished project. However, the enclosure wasn’t empty, it was merely cut in half by a solid wooden fence. On the other side of the fence I did see Hartmann’s mountain zebra’s, common elands and greater kudus in the other half of the enclosure.

Then I arrived at the first primates of the day; the hamadryas baboons. Their large enclosure consits mostly of rocks surrounded by a concrete moat, with a few dead trees and ropes to climb on. The enclosure is not as good looking as the one in Nürnberg, but it does provide the baboons with more space. Taking animal welfare into account, the baboon enclosure in Hellabrunn might be better overall. Unfortunately I only saw one baboon, sitting in front of the gates to their indoor enclosure.
On the other side of the path is a huge grassy paddock for a herd of Mhorr gazelles.

The red panda’s have not just one, but two enclosures. Between them is a pond, with a bridge going over it for the visitors to cross. What is really cool is that are logs going under the brigde that the panda’s can walk on, and which connect both panda enclosures when the gates are open. At the time of my visit, the panda (I only saw 1) did have access to both enclosures and was currently using the larger of the two.

From the panda enclosure is a path leading to ‘Dschungelwelt’, one of the zoos tropical houses. Unfortunately, the building was closed as it is undergoing major renevations at the moment. It should re-open in 2025 with an Asian theme. I can’t wait to see the end result!

Across from the panda’s is a very nice, natural looking enclosure for red-river hogs that was designed to resemble a river bank. This enclosure gave me some ‘Nürnberg vibes’ and I think it would look right at home if you’d copy/paste in into the aforementioned zoo. I also really liked the closeby nyala enclosure.

Next to the red panda’s and across from the nyala’s in the ‘Schildkrötenhaus’, the house for giant tortoises. The outdoor enclosure, a small grassy field surrounded by rocks and wooden poles, is simple but effective. Since the temperatures were quite low, the tortoises weren’t outside at the moment, so I went into the building itself to see them. The tortoise house is basically a small glass-roofed rainforest house, which means the temperature and humidity are high here. Inside is just a single path that takes you from the entrance to the exit. The majority of the building is being taken up by the indoor enclosure for the Aldabra giant tortoises. It consists of a dirt surface, with scattered rocks and tropical plants both inside and outside the enclosure. In the plants and trees above the tortoises are free-flying vasa parrots and flying foxes, although I only spotted the former.

In addition to all this are a few smaller terraria, located all along the other side of the path. One of these keeps a much smaller relative of the giant tortoise, the Egyptian tortoise. All of the other terraria in this row have a variety of invertabrates in them, including giant land snails, praying mantis and different types of stick insects as well as three species of terrestrial hermit crabs.

The final and much larger terrarium, just before the exit, has three species of cold-blooded vertebrates; Anthony’s poison frogs (not seen), anoles and a surprisingly active Solomon Island skink.

After the tortoise house I had to choose what path to follow next. I decided to take the middle path that would take me towards the elephant house, kangaroo enclosures, Welt der Affen, Aquarium and Urwaldhaus.

The elephant house is in a few ways similar to the rhino house from before, as it’s another accessible building that has the indoor housing for an Asian pachyderm, with the outdoor enclosures surrouding it on all sides. There’s a path going all around the elephant house and enclosures; this is the path I would have taken if I’d had chosen to take the right path, but because I could tell there were no elephants outside, I didn’t bother to do so. From what I did see, the enclosure seemed pretty average; a lot of sand, some rocks and dead trees and a pond for the elephants to swim in. Some trees and foliage, obviously out of reach for the elephants, makes it all look a lot more natural.

The elephant house is a round-shaped building with domed glass roof. The building itselfs consists of a visitor area, the indoor area for the elephant herd, an adjacent smaller enclosure with some seperation boxes and the indoor area for the bull. Like most elephant houses, the space the elephants have is limited, especially since the elephant herd was currently restricted to only a small part of their enclosure due to assumed constructions works. The main indoor enclosure has a sandy floor and a pool, even though I think I’d prefer it if there would be no pool; it takes up quite some space, and I assume it is barely used. The secondary enclosure, where the elephants were restricted to at the moment, is really small and has a concrete floor; I hope this situation didn’t last long. The visitor area has two floors and gives the visitors the option to view the animals from below or above. The best part of the building is the education, as it was plentyful and of high quality.

Across from the elephant house are the kangaroo enclosures. The first one I encountered was a simple grassy paddock for red kangaroos. They can also be viewed indoors in a patio-like pavillion building with a covered visitor path. The next enclosure for swamp wallabies was larger than the one for red kangaroos, as well as much more natural looking, partially thanks to the ponds inside the enclosure that are directly connected to the stream that runs through the zoo. A wallaby that would take a sip out of the water in their inside enclosure would basically be drinking directly from the Isar river. Good stuff! Also I should not forget to mention the wallabies share their enclosure with emus.

The swamp wallabies can also be viewed indoors in enclosures similar to the ones the red kangaroos have. Here you will also find the indoor housing for the third and last species of kangaroo; the agile wallaby. Besides the seperate enclosures for both species, there was also a smaller enclosure (with an indoor and an outdoor part) for a surplus single male of both species. Ofcourse, the agile wallabies have an outdoor enclosure as well, and it’s spacious, lush and natural looking. I really enjoyed watching the large group with animals of varying ages. This is a species that’s only kept in 2 zoos in Europe these days, so seeing them again was fantastic.

At this point at had arrived at the ‘Welt der Affen’, the first out of two large primate-focused areas. The first things I saw were some islands, but they were not currently in use and the moat was dry, which was somewhat disappointing as a prefer watching monkeys in outdoor enclosures. I then came across the large outdoor enclosure for silvery gibbons, which consists of two connected islands dominated by the huge climbing frame made of bamboo. I’m not sure if this island was currently accessible for the gibbons as I didn’t see them outside.

In order to actually see any primates, I went ‘inside’ the Welt der Affen. This area is somewhat patio-shaped. The path forms a square, with the indoor enclosure on the outside border and the orangutan outdoor enclosure in the middle of this square. After entering the area, I went right first and here the path takes you inside a building where you can find the indoor enclosures for the species that inhabit the areforementioned currently empy islands.

The first species in this house (unless you walk in the reversed direction obviously) is the ring-tailed lemur. Their glass-fronted enclosure consists of two parts, the front area with a low ceiling that has some natural substrate, and the back area that has a concrete flooring, tiled walls and a lot of climbing opportunities in the form of tree trunks and ropes. Not bad! There were some Azara’s agouti’s in this enclosure as well.

The second enclosure is unfortunately a lot smaller. I would say it is too small for the species inside, the red ruffed lemur. This zoo didn’t have a lot of enclosures I disliked; this was the first one that felt inaquate (even though this is mostly because there was currently no outdoor access). I hope by this time the lemurs have access to their islands once again. At least they - as well as the other primates - have natural sunlight coming in through the glass ceiling.

The third enclosure is a smaller one for cotton-top tamarins. Unfortunately, there were construction works going on in the (outdoor) enclosure for this species, which ment they were currently off-show. This might also explain why the moat surrounding the monkey islands was empty.

The fourth and fifth enclosures house spider monkeys and siamangs in rotation; currently the spider monkeys were in the smaller of the two, while the siamang was in the larger. The smaller enclosure is similar in size and shape to the one for ruffed lemurs, which means it felt inadequate without access the outdoor enclosure. The larger of the two is very similar to the ring-tailed lemur one, so much better size-wise. Because this enclosure also had the low ceiling in the front, the highest part in the back of the enclosure was out of view; this was probably where the siamang(s) was/were, because I wasn’t able to see any. Like the lemur enclosure there were some agouti’s in here as well!

I exited the building on the other side, and walked past the outdoor enclosure for Sumatran orangutans. Visitors can walk around this enclosure, which has multiple glass panel viewing areas. The enclosure is covered by steel-mesh on the top, to create some height to it. Inside are a lot of ropes and other climbing structes. It is not a very natural looking enclosure, but not relying on a moat does mean the available space is used in a good way. Unfortunately, the orangutans were not out.

The drill enclosure was next. It has a modern look to it, with an interesting shape and some decent-looking mockrock and fake trees. However, the lack of foliage and the limited space do add up to an average enclosure at best.

From here, the path goes inside a building again, where I found the indoor enclosures for the family group of drills immediately on my right hand side. I wasn’t a big fan; the entire area is quite small and dark and besides some logs for climbing, it’s all concrete. They drills had the option to go outside but chose to be indoors during the time of my visit. Next to this enclosure is a copy/paste enclosure for a second group of drills, 3 males. They however did not have the option to go outside as it turned out their outdoor enclosure is a rotation enclosure.

Finally, this building also features the indoor quarters for the orangutans. Even though this one also only has hard flooring, it’s also a whole lot bigger and gets much more sunlight. The orangutans have a lot of climbing and toy enrichment available to them, and I saw a lot of activity here. I spend some time watching the entics of the large group of orange apes as they’d be my only orangutans of the trip. Once outside again, I found the outdoor enclosure for the bachelor group of drills. It is similar to the other one, with one big difference; it has a visitor tunnel with some viewing panels going through it. Even though I like the idea of this, it does come at the cost of ground space the monkeys have. Like I stated previously, this enclosure is a rotational one; the drills were inside, but I did find the other species outside: the red-capped mangabey. Finally, I got to see some primates in their outdoor enclosures! This was the first time that happened today save the a single baboon I saw.

At this point, I could have gone through the tunnel and that have would taken me to the aquarium; however, I still needed to finish the ‘Welt der Affen’ first, so I continued into another corner building where I found the indoor enclosure for the mangabeys. It is similar to the drill enclosures, but luckily quite a lot bigger!

Finally, I arrived at the indoor enclosures for the primate species I was looking foward to the most; silvery gibbons. I love all gibbons but I have a special fondness for this species. They have no less than 3 indoor enclosures, which were all connected at the time of my visit. I saw 3 gibbons, and I hoped to see them go outside at some point, but no such luck. (Fun fact; As I saw silvery gibbons before in Prague, Zlin and Halle, I have now visited all zoos in Europe with this species.)

Since I had now arrived back at the entry point of the ‘Welt der Affen’ area, I went back to the drill/mangabey enclosure and walked through the tunnel to visit the aquarium and see some even primates.

After exiting the tunnel through the mangabey/drill enclosure, I came across the outdoor chimpanzee enclosure that is part of the ‘Urwaldhouse’. It’s a very decent enclosure, with plenty of greenery and climbing opportunties. Large glass panels surround almost the entire enclose. A bit to the right is a similar although somewat larger enclosure for the third big ape, the gorilla. Unfortunately neither of these species were outside. A bridge over a pool that apparantly has sturgeons in it takes you inside the Urwaldhaus, which is where the chimps and gorilla’s have their indoor enclosures. First though, I was going to visit the aquarium/terrarium building, which is kinda randomly situated between the ‘Welt der Affen’ and the ‘Urwaldhaus’. Judging by the classical style of the aquarium, I assume it has been here since before the primate enclosures were constructed around it.

The building seems to be very small when looked at it from outside; this is because even though the ‘upper’ floor does have a few terraria for poisonous snakes, the actual aquarium is underground and only accesible by going down the stairways in the middle of the building. Before going down, I first took a look at the snake terraria that are build into the walls of the building. These consist of seven beautifully decorated tropical or arid themed habitats. The species line-up is quite nice, with Taylor’s moccasin even being a new species for me. The others are cape coral snake, forest cobra, Baron’s green racer, copperhead (not seen), Western Gaboon viper and Urucoa rattlesnake.

Once downstairs, I found myself in a dark corridor with aquaria build into the walls. This corridor leads to the biggest tank at the end, where you turn around walk back through a second corridor back to the exit. The first aquarium I encountered was a tank for different types of cichlids. If my memory serves me right, this tank had no signage whatsoever, and since I’m not an expert on cichlids (there’s just too many species) I’m not able to tell exactly what was in here.

Next up was a tank for red piranas, along with some smaller South American species. There was also a tank for living coral with a few small fishes. A similar tank features amongst others ,a porcupinefish. The Amazon tank with the expected fish species (barred sorumbin, red-tailed catfish, pacu, arowana) was quite small for such large species. Another tank houses two species of gar – spotted gar and alligator gar. Next up is a tank with the only amphibian in the building; the lake Pátzcuaro salamander. Another larger tank keeps different kinds of Asian freshwater fishes, including lemon barb, clown loach, giant redfin gourami and a real rarity: the Malayan leaffish. There is also another tank with cichlids, featuring species like lemon cichlid, blunthead cichlid, featherfin cichlid Five-barred lamprologus and the very rare Dewindt`s cichlid.

All the way in the back is the largest aquarium, a coral reef display featuring a bunch of small tropical fishes like golden-headed sleeper goby, copperband butterflyfish and a variety of surgeonfishes and damselfishes, along with a single black-tip reef shark for which the tank is probably too small. The second corridor starts with a tank for lionfishes, who co-exist with species like shortfin turkeyfish and picasso triggerfish.

A small tropical tank keeps a few small species like Bangai cardinal fish and spotted garden eel. Another keeps a whole lot of clownfish as well as a Valentini’s sharpnose puffer and a third has a group of razorfishes.

A freshwater tank focuses on species from Africa and displays lionhead cichlid, jewel cichlid, niger tetra, golden congo tetra, African knifefish and a giant freshwater pufferfish. After two tanks with African cichlids, there is also one for South American species, including redhead cichlid and yellow acara, as well as striped headstanders. Another South-American tank has Sven’s eartheater, common severum, silver dollars, pleco’s and a white-spotted freshwater stingray that has barely any room to move around in. Yet another South-American tank features glowlight tetra, blackline tetra and whitespot tetra.

A cold saltwater aquarium only has a single fish species, the dwarf mullet, but at least it’s the only holding in Europe of this species. Maybe my favorite tank in the aquarium has just a single species in it: horseshoe crabs. I just think they’re such cool creatures! Or maybe it’s the tank at the end of the aquarium that has the unique-looking warty frogfish!

Overall, the aquarium didn’t impress me. The subterranean corridors are dark and lack atmosphere. None of the tanks were very unique or interesting, it’s all stuff I’ve seen dozens of times before. The larger fishes do not have a lot of space to swim around in. And even though there are a couple of rarities in this aquarium, none of those are particulary exciting species.

If I would revisit Tierpark Hellabrunn in the future and if I would have limited time, I would have no issues just skipping the aquarium. The zoo has much better things to offer! Speaking of which, it is finally time to check out the Urwaldhaus!
 
ralph said:
I hope by this time the lemurs have access to their islands once again. At least they - as well as the other primates - have natural sunlight coming in through the glass ceiling.
Click to expand...
When I visited on May 25, the lemurs and spider monkeys were fortunately outdoors. The siamangs, however were still indoors in the same small enclosure you mentioned, just as I have always seen on my visits . The tamarin enclosure construction was still going on at the time so that might not be the reason (or at least the main reason) why the moats were dry for the longest time.

ralph said:
The second corridor starts with a tank for lionfishes, who co-exist with species like shortfin turkeyfish and picasso triggerfish.
Click to expand...
I have also seen juvenile epaulette sharks in that tank a couple of times. I can’t blame you for missing them, they tend to hide in the crevices a lot.
 
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