Giant armadillo sleeping (old photo)

Stork and Ostrich House, London ZSL, late 1970s?

A species I never saw. I think the animal left for Artis in 1980. It had arrived in 1976, as a part of a collection presented to the Queen by the President of Brazil.

Sorry to contradict you, Ian, but the giant armadillo was sent to Blijdorp (Rotterdam) in 1978 not Artis (Amsterdam).

WOW!!! Very impressed, whilst simultaneously being VERY envious. A species I've always wanted to see, but probably never will.....

A species I wish I would have been alive to see. Fantastic little beastie's.

H'mm. Little is not the best word for them! One animal in the wild weighed 54kilos!

Seriously, as a species of conservation concern it is a pity that there is no back-up zoo population.

Did I dream it or were there two of them at Regents Park for a while at this time?

Alan

One of my dream species to view someday; especially at the LA Zoo.

I think that there was just a solitary giant armadillo at London Zoo during this period, Alan. I only ever saw a single specimen in the old Stork and Ostrich House during the 1970s.

As has been mentioned in an earlier post, the President of Brazil presented the Queen with this giant armadillo in 1976 which was then deposited at London Zoo.

This animal was then sent to Rotterdam Zoo in 1978 to make the only pair in Europe.

(The only other giant armadillo at London Zoo that I'm aware of was the specimen received in 1959; this is listed in that year's annual report as being a species new to the collection.)

The London Zoo was a Disneyland of biological diversity in the 1970s (not that they don't still have a decent collection). It must have been fantastic to see forest elephants, giant armadillo, angwantibo, etc.