Zoo Map, 1983

Haitian Hutias were kept until about 1981, and Jamaican Hutias until the early 90's.

@Hix I guess they never bred and were phased out ?

The Jamaican hutias certainly did - the Bartlett Society records a UK first breeding at Jersey in 1975. Given the colony kept itself going for 20 years, I suspect this wasn't the only birth.

As an aside, I think their enclosure was opened by the legendary James Stewart (whose daughter was a conservationist).

@Gavialis That is interesting ! I knew that Jimmy stewart was a fan of Durrell as I remember seeing footage of him at Jersey holding one of the baby gorillas born at the zoo.

I wonder why they eventually stopped keeping the hutia then as it is still listed as an IUCN endangered species to this day.

Maybe if you write to them they'll tell you and you could post this information here.

We used to have a couple of Jersey Zoo staff as members here (Rick J and JerseyLotte) who posted frequently who might have been able to answer your question, but I haven't seen anything from either for some years, unfortunately.

@Carl Jones has worked for the Trust for many years, albeit mostly in Mauritius, but he may know why the zoo went out of Hutias.

@Hix Yes, would love to reach out to them to find out about past species kept if they would be willing to tell more about this.

From reading some of those old threads sadly I dont think either of those two members are active anymore.

I have been meaning to reach out to Carl for a while so yes I may well do that.