View of the Guinea Baboon enclosure

I wonder why the part of the fence nearest the pond is covered? A windbreak?

From your other photo I was going to say its a very attractive exhibit, but looking at this one it doesn't seem quite so- the public barrier seems to be set well back so the animals must be rather distant and seen through the mesh? But its been well done for the animals....

Its not covered by anything Pertinax,its concrete sections that hold back the soil/aggregate that the walk-way has been built up with. You cant go any further than the last person has that you can see in the photo. The walkway ends there and then the next enclosure,"world farm" runs up close to the Baboon fence. The animals come very close,directly below you,for most of the walkway as the water doesn't come that far round. Its another one of Y.W.P. very clever enclosures where you can get good views over the top of fences rather than looking through mesh or glass. They use a lot of slippery plastic top sections to the fence with an over-hang so there is no grip and no risk of escape. They have used this system on the Lemur walk-through exhibit, open-top Leopard and Marmosets enclosures too.
Hope this helps you understand the layout better.

Yes, it does, thanks. From what you say it sounds well designed for viewing as well as for the animals. Another success for them. Taking on this group of Baboons was a good move- a large ready made active group and it satisfies the public's desire to have seen 'Monkeys'.

They were really active and mischievous on Saturday,my last visit, and were a big hit with the public. The keepers threw some pine cones into the Baboons at one point and these caused some major confrontation between some of the younger ones and the adults.

I just hope they have taken heed and good feedback from all this sort of enclosure and going to implement something similar for the Polar bear areas. But looking at the artists impression im a little worried it will be glass viewing panels only (rubbish for photography). It would be great if they had underwater viewing incorporated into the pools they have planned. But maybe I'm expecting too much.

I was once at a Zoo with a large group of Mandrills. They were nearly all sleeping in their various shelters. I had a small pine cone in my pocket and threw it into the enclosure(naughty me... ). A small juvenile that was awake, quickly grabbed it and started rolling it around on the floor. A bigger youngster was alerted by the unusual noise, and immediately snatched it and ran off to examine it. That awoke several others and within minutes the whole group were awake and chasing each other around to get hold of it- a chain reaction all generated by one little pine cone.

How much are admission charges for Mandrills now-a-days?

And yes,naughty you Pertinax.

You get a reduction with groups of over twenty.

Not that long ago actually. Wasn't I a devil...I made sure no one was looking though, but they had 'such fun' with it....

I did worse at Bristol Zoo once when I was about ten (I used to spend whole days there in the zoo on my own)- I hung a scarf down to the Rhesus monkeys in the temple when no-one was around- one jumped the gap and grabbed it and started climbing up - I dropped it pretty quick and made myself scarce.