Lion enclosure » Chester Zoo

Lion enclosure
09-04-2008

Hi, i wonder if any of you would be able to inform me of how big the enclosure is at chester zoo and also what kind of daily routines they would follow on a daily basis with lions? i.e health checks.....do they occur on a daily basis, cleaning out everyday?

Im trying to design my own enclosure for an assignment and wanted to get a few ideas starting with chester zoo. My favourite zoo :-)

I have tried emailing the zoo with no luck.

Thank you very much

09-04-2008

For feeding, the keepers go up a set of stairs up to the roof of the lion house and throw the food off into the paddock or hide the food whilst the lions are inside. Health checks, I believe, are performed in crush cages inside the lion house...

09-04-2008

I'd say the paddock's about half an acre.

09-04-2008

The enclosure is almost triangular in shape, the western and eastern sides being approximately 250 feet long, and the southern side around 200 feet long. The area is about 2500 square feet, or as Chris says half an acre.

Fences are checked every morning before the lions are given access to the enclosure. The foundations are old concrete road traps left over from World War II. This enclosure was the first open air lion enclosure to be built, and before Longleat Safari Park opened in 1967, local council officials visited Chester Zoo to see for themselves how big cats could be safely housed behind a wire mesh fence.

They are fed six days a week, (not Fridays) on fresh cow and horse meat, also given are whole rabbits, chickens and turkeys. The food is sometimes sprinkled with vitamin powder.

The house was built in 1984 and consists of inter-connected dens one of which has public viewing. Straw bedding is provided.

The enclosure contains many trees, some are protected and some can be used as scratching posts. On the eastern side of the enclosure where the path between Jubilee Square and the Fountain shop runs, there is a plaque on the wall of the stables pointing out where the lions have left claw marks in the brickwork. This area was part of the original enclosure.

There is also a raised platform on which the lions can sit

The lions must be vaccinated against feline enteritis and cat flu, at 10 and 18 weeks old, and once a year thereafter. New lions coming into the zoo have a health check.

I expect cleaning is done every day apart form when a female has cubs in her den.

That's all I know at the moment.

10-04-2008

That's an interesting fact which I wasn't aware of... On my visit last year I noted that this enclosure is virtually unchanged since my earliest visits to Chester many years ago, though there have been various different lions living in it.

10-04-2008

You're right Pertinax. The only changes have been to side of the triangle alongside the service yard, where a path has been made from what was formerly part of the enclosure, as bongorob has pointed out already. I presume this means that the current house is in a slightly different position from the original one. If I remember correctly that was made of concrete (perhaps more of Mr Mottershead's recycled WW2 defences) and you could climb up stairs to view the enclosure from its roof.

Alan

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11-04-2008

First I must apologise for the mistake in my eariler posting. Chester Zoo did not have the first open air lion enclosure, what I meant to say was that they had the first open air lion enclosure not to have been constructed with iron bars.

The area was first proposed as a lion enclosure in 1937 and on 19th October Viscount Leverhulme laid the foundation stone which can still be seen in the zoo.

The original plan was for a walled enclosure with a raised terrace along the south side, underneath which would be a cafeteria.

The second world war put paid to any building work, but when the war ended the zoo snapped up huge amounts of war surplus materials. The wire fence was recycled airfield runway wire link netting and the rest of the enclosure was built from anti-tank road blocks which were huge concrete structures weighing approximately 700kg. A total of 118 of these blocks were utilised.

The den was built adjoining the stable block at the north-east corner of the exhibit.

The fence was 12 feet high with a three foot wide overhang at an angle of 45 degrees. A ramp leading to a terrace was constructed along the southern half of the eastern boundary, underneath the terrace was an aviary.

The exhibit was reported to be capable of housing 20 to 30 adult lions which seems doubtful. Construction was complete by December 1946 and the enclosure opened on 30th March 1947. The delay was because of the severe winter weather I would guess.

11-04-2008

Bongorob, when were African Lions moved out of the enclosure in favour of Asians?

11-04-2008

It was 1994

11-04-2008

Phew- that's a bit of an overestimate I reckon.

11-04-2008

If you want to know anything about lion cages in other zoo's then there are 4 on zoolex.

13-04-2008

Did they ever get anywhere close to the 20 lions they wanted to house there?

13-04-2008

I remember the usual number was 1.4 and a few cubs. In 1973 new big cat enclosures were constructed to house a second lion group. The Twilight Zone was built on this site.