A new indoor zoo is opened recently, it's situated at the mall 'RIO' which is owned by Tashir group of companies. Previously they successfully realized projects of public aquaria in malls. Don't have much pics yet, but surely there will be more soon The space is 2400 sqm, 2 floors. 4 themed areas (Asia, Africa, Australia, South America) + separate bird zone. Sample of species are Bornean orangutan, chimpanzee, clouded leopard, serval, cheetah, red panda, great Indian hornbill, Old&New World monkeys, lemurs, Patagonian mara, yellow mongoose, marabou, parrots, herps & fish as usual. Tapirs, pygmy hippo, cougar and aardvark are also listed but I'm not sure if they're really there. Looks like it's a private zoo but it should participate in EAZA or there would be no way to get such species legally. It's a bit disturbing that all apes are babies, and their origin can be doubtful. The similar zoo is built at St.Petersburg, also in 'RIO' mall. Page of the zoo in Russian social network http://vk.com/public64857341
All-indoor husbandry is acceptable for smaller species if given enough UV and good air conditioning, but for big cats & ungulates it's not appropriate Still the exhibits look better than in many Russian zoos. I just hope they would preserve the animals when any dies... those cool specimens must not be incinerated!
This place looks absolutely fascinating. There is some really great species: Allen swamp monkey, Indian hornbill, black mangabey, northern fur seal... Any ideas on the identity of this one: http://cs617326.vk.me/v617326386/1b51/kHj5jmrRWHQ.jpg ...mitred langur?! Baby chimpanzees, baby gibbons, baby orang-utans... you do have to wonder where all these animals came from...
Sooty Mangabey? And the "Allen swamp monkey" looks to me to be a Sykes monkey... And the chimps look like a very impressive violation of Cites.
As suggested by @Al, I'm pretty sure this is a leucistic black mangabey. I saw one, possibly two, such animals at Szeged Zoo in Hungary, in 1995. I wonder whether there is any connection - there can't be too many of them knocking about.....
I think that the origin of apes is semi-legal, so they're captive-bred in native countries but not listed in official studbooks (and possibly rejected/early weaned from mothers). Don't know about orangs, but at Russian sites there often can be seen ads about selling imported gibbons & siamangs. If the zoo owners really cared, they would import breeding pairs/groups of apes from EAZA accredited zoos, rather than getting cute, human-imprinted, crowd-pulling infants that will never contribute to species' conservation. Alexkant, do you know whether they'll get aardvarks, pygmy hippos & tapirs?
Have you ever encountered any breeding station for apes in western Africa, apart from rehab stations that wouldn't surely send babies abroad to a dubious zoo? All monkeys there are wild caught, especially gibbons are a pain to watch. Baby gibbons sitting on a fake rock in an aquarium? I Wonder why Russian zoos are not making noise about that while they were very vocal about the "Marius case"? This institution is throwing zoos back to the 70's.
New zoo.... I'm not comfortable about large hornbills and flamingos spending their lives indoors either.
And there has been news of monkeys and apes coming in from Western-Africa through Armenia to Russia. Of course with all CITES permits faked. Of at least a part of those shipments it is known that they in the end were shipped to Russia.
Shopping mall zoos, not nice for the animals. Probably no fresh air, natural light or sunshine, or rain for that matter.
Of course it is, unfortunately with the current political situation in Armenia I don't see this changing in the near future.
I am not sure. The local zoo and the Foundation that is involved there is also focussing on local conservation issues (and which will / must include the CITES loop-holing). For Russia, I remain more skeptical for a clean-up … (knowing that respected Dr. Spitsin was replaced by a managerial nitwit at Moskwa Zoo).
She is not nitwit. She is greedy and unscrupulous scoundrel (if we can trust mass media). There is a rumour that Dr. Spitsin is going to quit soon.
