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Animals you'll never see in a zoo #2

Discussion in 'General Zoo Discussion' started by Potto, 18 Jun 2008.

  1. Potto

    Potto Well-Known Member

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    Last edited by a moderator: 18 Jul 2008
  2. Potto

    Potto Well-Known Member

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    Seaworld in Queensland have a young pair on display[/QUOTE]

    There is one zoo in Temuco, Chile that keeps kodkod... I think....:confused:
     
  3. Sun Wukong

    Sun Wukong Well-Known Member

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    Yeah, @Potto, I do know that saolas have been kept in zoos; there are even videos of that available:
    Image - Saola in captivity - Saola - Pseudoryx nghetinhensis - ARKive

    However, as You correctly remarked, all specimen died pretty soon-so officially, no saola is currently kept in a zoo.

    And about Dugongs: I think the ones at Toba and Singapore have already been mentioned, haven't they?

    Looking at patrick's remark about river dolphins: well, the one Boto left at Duisburg now lives in a quiet a nice exhibit and it seems that Venezuela Aquarium also keeps at least some Botos.
    |Aquarium de Valencia| - Fundación J.V.Seijas
    Haupt IT - Delfine und Stromausfälle Fütterung der Ungeheuer
     
    Last edited: 19 Jun 2008
  4. kiang

    kiang Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    Thanks for the links Sun wukong, the Valencia aquarium seem to treat their dolphins like bottle nosed dolphins in similar sort of environment and is there only one pool for them there?
     
  5. Sun Wukong

    Sun Wukong Well-Known Member

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    My pleasure, @kiang. The author of the link states that they keep 2.3 animals. The three females are on the show, which means there must be a second exhibit for the males during show time (or they just fool around while the "ladies" have to work...;)
     
  6. Chlidonias

    Chlidonias Moderator Staff Member 15+ year member

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    I just re-read this thread all the way from the start, very interesting.

    no-one took up on glyn's corroboree frog question. Are there any overseas now? I know in one of Gerald Durrell's books he mentions in passing that he had kept (bred?) them in the Jersey Zoo's reptile house.

    Re leopard seals, Napier Marineland in NZ had one many years ago (in the 80s?). I've seen a photo in a book showing it leaping to take a fish from a trainer, the way dolphins do. VERY impressive photo given the seal's huge length!!

    EDIT: I just went to the Marineland site Marineland of New Zealand, Napier - History
    They got 2 leopard seals in 1969, 1 in 1971, 2 in 1976, and 1 in 1984. The first leopard seal show was in 1969. Other interesting animals they have had include dusky dolphins, pigmy sperm whales, Weddell's seals and yellow-eyed penguins.

    Re giant armadillo, London Zoo has had at least one. There is a photo in "The World Of Zoos" (1968) of a keeper posing with one next to a three-banded armadillo for size comparison. Other interesting photos in the book include a Sumatran rhino at Copenhagen, giant pandas at Moscow and London, Philippine tarsier at Frankfurt, manatees at Georgetown and four shoebills at Frankfurt.
     
    Last edited: 1 Jul 2008
  7. gentle lemur

    gentle lemur Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    I saw the giant armadillo at Regent's Park in the early '70s. It was in the Stork & Ostrich House and was asleep inside on the couple of times I saw it (you used to be able to go inside then). I think I have a photo somewhere - I'll add it to my list of photos to dig out.

    Alan
     
  8. Chlidonias

    Chlidonias Moderator Staff Member 15+ year member

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    I love giant armadillos, one of the many many animals on my want-to-see-in-the-wild list. I'm sure this or another London Zoo giant armadillo ties in with Gerald Durrell (or maybe David Attenborough, seeing they were both collecting animals for British zoos at the same time; but I have "Zoo Quest To Guiana", and there's nothing about giant armadillos in there). Anyway, as I recall, Durrell was trying to catch a giant armadillo by special request of London Zoo but couldn't find any, and when he got back home discovered that by coincidence another collector had managed to catch one for the Zoo instead. For some reason I always assumed the one in the 1968 zoo book to be this individual, but I just checked the dates of Durrell's expeditions and they were in 1950 to British Guiana ("Three Singles To Adventure"), 1953-54 to Argentina and Paraguay ("The Drunken Forest") and 1958 to Argentina ("The Whispering Land").
     
  9. Chlidonias

    Chlidonias Moderator Staff Member 15+ year member

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  10. gentle lemur

    gentle lemur Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    I'm sure that giant armadillo photo is a good deal older than 1968; its style is from the '50s (or even earlier) - so it may be the specimen that you mention.

    Alan
     
  11. Potto

    Potto Well-Known Member

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    Kouprey was also kept at Vincennes Zoo in Paris in 1937;)

    sorry for the correction again:eek:
     
  12. Chlidonias

    Chlidonias Moderator Staff Member 15+ year member

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    the English edition of the book is from 1968, the original German from 1966. The caption speaks of the armadillo in the present tense "A giant armadillo... may be seen at the London Zoo. It measures five feet from nose to tail and weighs nearly 133 pounds."

    But I totally agree it does have a 1950s air about it and it probably was taken then, which may be (subconciously) why I have always equated it with the armadillo that Durrell wrote about.
     
  13. Sun Wukong

    Sun Wukong Well-Known Member

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    Potto-just like the already mentioned saola, there are CURRENTLY no koupreys in any zoos worldwide. If You want to take into count historical husbandries, then a lot of the animals listed were at least once kept in captivity somewhere. If You just count current husbandries-which I did on the list You cite, then neither koupreÿs or saolas or...are kept in a zoo nowadays.

    And to precise-the kouprey was kept in Paris from 1937-1941/2, as then-Zoo director Achille Urbain who had officially described the species after obtaining the horns from the veterinarian René Sauvel was highly interested in this species. BTW: a Cambodian nobleman might have have also kept one.
     
  14. Sun Wukong

    Sun Wukong Well-Known Member

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    Re: giant armadillos. Duisburg kept all in 3 individuals from 1973-1976. Hannover and Frankfurt as well as Berlin kept some in the 1930-40s, Wroclaw Zoo in the 1960s.
     
  15. Pertinax

    Pertinax Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    That very smart style of keeper's uniform is more mid-1950's.
     
  16. Pertinax

    Pertinax Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    But is it a genuine species, or is that individual, (the only one to be photographed?) a hybrid/crossbred animal?
     
  17. Sun Wukong

    Sun Wukong Well-Known Member

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  18. Chris79

    Chris79 Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    David Attenborough's attempts to find a giant armadillo are described in "Zoo Quest in Paraguay" (1959). Despite many days searching the chaco on horseback, he and his team were unsuccessful. The closest they came was finding tracks and food burrows which he was told were around four days old. Intriguingly, he mentions at the end of his book crossing paths in Buenos Aires with an "animal collector friend and his wife", who I presume must have been Gerald and Jacquie Durrell. They were also searching for the giant armadillo and were about to set off for northern Argentina to follow a lead. However, Attenborough mentions that months later he found out they too had been unsuccessful.
     
  19. Chlidonias

    Chlidonias Moderator Staff Member 15+ year member

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    well there you go then...I knew it was one of them -- I just picked the wrong one!
     
  20. Zoogoer2000

    Zoogoer2000 Well-Known Member

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    I know this post was a long time ago but i just wanted to inform you that I thinkthere were pangolin at Toronto Zoo.I only think so because there was one at toronto zoo on a 1980's zoo movie called Zoo Adventure.There are definitely none anymore and i heard they don't do well in captivity.