Edmonton's Polar Park

Edmonton's Polar Park
25-12-2007

The Polar Park was a zoo that was situated 15 miles outside of Edmonton, Alberta in western Canada. It opened on August 1st, 1959, and I visited there many times when I was a child. When I was 10 years old, in 1986, I left Edmonton and never revisited the zoo. Either in the late eighties or early nineties the park was closed for good. The lack of funds derailed plans on keeping the place open, and the impressive animal collection was sold off to various other organizations. If anyone has information on the closing of this establishment then please feel free to add to this thread.

The Polar Park was originally named the Alberta Game Farm, and was run and operated by an ex-boxer named Al Oeming. It consisted almost entirely of ungulates, carnivores, and birds. There were no typical pavilions or large buildings, and instead there were large, fenced paddocks for the animals. These exhibits were often very plain and basic, but enormous in size. Most of the hoofed mammals had spacious areas to roam, and there were a number of large herds at the park.

Highlights: (based on the late seventies zoo guide that I own)

- in 1971 a young pair of mountain gorillas were obtained. The male was 3 years old and named Sultan, and the female was almost 2 and called Zakula.
- white-tailed and white-bearded gnus
- the only captive breeding herd of rocky mountain goats
- at the time one of only 3 zoos to have Dall Sheep
- wood bison, prairie bison, and wisent
- peary's, barren ground, woodland and osborn caribou
- the only gayal in North America
- a massive polar bear exhibit with 6 bears (2.4), complete with a 600,000 pool in the enclosure
- at least 10 different species of deer
- a pair of white rhinos
- a pair of pygmy hippos
- 5 species of zebra: grant's, damara, hartmann's mountain, chapman's, and grevy's
- malayan and mountain tapir
- free-ranging baikal seals in in a 1.5 mile long lake (no fences whatsoever), but the seals were almost impossible for the public to locate
- przewalski horses
- 10 species of pheasant
- at least 6 species of crane
- at least 13 species of goose

In my glossy magazine from the zoo there are many photos of animals walking through large amounts of snow. It is definitely unusual to see mountain gorillas, malayan tapirs, asian elephants and blackbuck antelope trudging through piles of snow, and the weather was a deterrent to people wanting to visit the zoo.

26-12-2007

Thanks, very interesting infos. I especially liked the part with the Baikal Seal; that would probably be one of the most promising ways to achieve breeding. Not to mention the Mountain tapir, the wildebeest and the gorillas... And the Rocky Mountain Goat herd makes me smile, remembering American and Canadian zoo people marvelling at the more or less common sight of this species in European collections.
TVArchive.ca - Alberta Game Farm

26-12-2007

Sun Wukong: thanks for the link to the television series, and I'm surprised that someone found out some info on the park.

26-12-2007

You're welcome.

Do You know what happened to the individual animals?

27-12-2007

I know that back in 1985-86 the two white rhinos (that had been captured from the wild) were sold to another zoo and were replaced by a family of about 3-4 european wild boar. I have no idea where any of the other animals disappeared to, other than the fact that the Polar Park was closed to the public and continued to have a large collection that steadily declined. It must have taken many years to dispense with the massive herds of deer, bison and antelope that they had accumulated since 1959.

27-12-2007

That's what I expected. Would have loved to know what happened to the Baikal seal, Mountain tapir/gorillas...

Polar Park
08-01-2008

Hello Everyone my name is Wayne and I have been researching Polar Park which is located just outside of Edmonton Alberta. Sorry to burst your bubble he didnt have mountain gorillas he had western lowlands he was a wrestling promoter turned animal dealer and so he exagerated a few things. The Bakial seals he had supposebly disappeared never to be found again. Alot of people in the zoo world even dought if he had them but there is a picture in his guide book he did have a vast array of rare animals. Barren ground caribou, Wisent, P horse, muskox, appaloosas and pinto reindeer, the originater of white elk, white rhino, 5 species of zebra, brazilian tapir kept in an unheated barn, breeding onagers, breeding snowleopards, amur leopard, amur tiger, golden cat, leopad cat, european wildcat, pallas cat, cheetah, Korsak fox, breeding wolverines, fisher, marten, Sarus and Demoiselle Cranes, Stanley and Wattled Cranes, Great Grey Owl, Gayal, Malayan Tapir, vicuna, gaur, peary caribou, , red panda and of course elephants. I also heard a zookeeper in the states visited his park in the eighties took a picture of a weird deer he saw and not until 10 years later did he find out what it was but a marsh deer from south America. There were no export records for this species of deer.

Regards,
Wayne

08-01-2008

@wzoocan: Thanks for the info!! I'm actually quite excited that someone out there has heard of the Polar Park, and looking at my post and yours confirms that it contained some truly rare and endangered animals. I am disappointed with the mountain/lowland gorilla confusion, as it clearly states in my guide book that they are mountain gorillas. Puzzling, but an exaggeration is definitely a possibility. The baikal seals are also photographed, and they are indeed that species of seal...but they were supposedly let loose in the 1.5 km Lost Lake and I guess that they were left to fend for themselves.

Do you have anything to add to my long post on Polar Park? When did it close down? What happened to Al Oeming and his animals? It was such an amazing collection that a few of us here at Zoobeat were curious as to the circumstances of the place closing for good.

11-01-2008

I am from Edmonton and was born in 1969. I have fond childhood memories of the Alberta Game Farm. I had completely forgotten that for the last few years it was known as the Polar Park. As I recall the game farm had notoriety as being the 2nd largest zoo (by area? by number of animals?) in North America. Al Oeming visited my elementary school once and brought his pet (I remembered it as a cougar, but I keep hearing that he brought a cheetah with him to schools) with him. This was a big hit with the kids! Eventually all of the animals got shipped off to other zoos. Now I am calling the Game Farm a zoo because the name game farm seems rather strange to me. A game farm seems like a place where animals are kept so that hunters could come in and shoot them, but that certainly never happened at the Alberta Game Farm, so the name is an enigma to me.

11-01-2008

@Brian: you are right in that it was only the last few years that the collection was known as the Polar Park. And yes Al Oeming did visit many schools, and he had 3 different tame cheetahs over the years. There are photos in my guide book that show a cheetah named Tawana with school kids, as well as a pet lynx called Tonga.

The total land area was 1,400 acres, but that included a 1.5 km lake. Apparently there were over 4,000 animals in total, with 100 different species as there were massive herds of ungulates. According to the guide book there were also 3,500 birds spanning 95 different species. It really is too bad that the collection was disbanded...but do you know when that happened? Late eighties?

11-02-2008

It would be great if the baikal seals could still be alive. Not so great that they are in Alberta not Russia but they could be caught and brought to zoo's

03-07-2008

[QUOTE=wzoocan;33104]breeding onagers, breeding snowleopards, amur leopard, amur tiger, golden cat, leopad cat, european wildcat, pallas cat, cheetah,

He also had a pair of big black cats. I was in my early teens, I was there to help my dad move one of the smaller building onto his farm, and was greated by these 2 cats as I got out of the truck. They were very friendly and big. That's really all I remember, other than Al standing by a tractor, said " They wont eat you "
I don't remember why or how my dad knew Al, but my dad seemed to speak highly of him, and helped him a couple times move stuff on the farm. This was in the late 60s or early 70s.

Polar park
13-10-2008

I know that polar park was still open past 1995 because i went there with my girlfriend multiple times and i didnt meet her until 1995.They still had many Tigers but i never ever saw the gorilla's and the lions were gone by 1995 too.They Still had lots of cheeta's he was trying to breed what was called a king cheeta which had an unusal patterned coat.Many other types of cats bobcats, cougars, lynx, north china leopards, wolverine, camels, elk, Some kind of wild boars, sheep, p horses.I think as time went on he was concentrating on animals that could bring in revenue like elk. and I think those cheeta;s were valuable too.Oh yea he had those Grizzlies{ swan hills sub spieces last of the huge plains bears} I saw that huge male bear stand on his hind legs. He must have been nine feet tall.and polar bears i remember one got out one day. I wasn't there but it was in the paper.

I just googled Al oeming
13-10-2008

And it said the park was open from 1958- 1998 and he now holds an auction of antique sleighs and cutters twice a year.

13-10-2008

Thanks for the update! When you went after 1995 were there many empty exhibits? Do you know where many of the animals were shipped to? At one time the collection was hugely impressive and contained many rare species, and so it's interesting how it just faded away...just the 6 polar bears and 600,000 gallon pool was amazing.