6 common rock Hyrax brought in to Africa alive. 3 from Marwell. 3 form Rotterdam. Unsure on the sexes.
Hi Nisha , the two male White Rhino which were born at Marwell and went to Flamingoland were "Basela" and "Shaka" , so maybe they changed their name(s) before moving on? Marwell`s first progeny was "Zimba" who was shot at South Lakes after escaping from the enclosure.
Bhasela - his name intact - is now the breeding male at Boras (he is a proven sire, alas a stillbirth). Shaka - to the best of my knowledge - remains at Flamingoland - MALTON. He arrived ex Marwell in 2007 (along with Kashka from Whipsnade).
What would everyone like to see Africa Alive! acquire? Personally, for me, I'd like to see it get more birds and Okapi B)
Personally, I would like to see more sp in the plains exhibit firstly. They have a pair of East african crowned cranes and Guineafowl? Secondly the older chimpanzee's are retired and are well in to their 40's they remain together "jack and jill" and it was decided a long time ago that after they pass on AA will not get any more Chimps. So building a new enclosure for them would be a pointless finacial drain. Waterbuck would be another good sp to bring in. The "marsh" currently houses (seperatley) Nile and Kafue Flats Lechwe, Situanga and Ankole. The previous are marsh antelope and do very well in these enclosures. Waterbuck would be a wonderful for the park. Leopards have also been in the frame and plans for a while. However finacial restrictions, etc make this a distant plan. Okapi would always be nice and more birds? There african birds of prey section is quite good anyway!
I would like to see a baboon species at Africa Alive on a decent sized island on big lawn that is by the kids playground. Something like the enclosure at Flamingoland. Hamadryas baboon or Guinea baboon in good numbers would make a nice show with both easily sourced by making splinter groups from Paignton or Port Lympne perhaps?
On the 28th of April the male chimpanzee ‘Jimmy’ sadly passed away. Diagnosed at the beginning of 2010 with a serious age-related degenerative heart condition, he was prescribed daily medication. However, over the last few months his condition had deteriorated although he remained active and appeared happy. Initial post mortem results show that he had a heart attack. ‘Jimmy’ was a real character and was loved by both staff and public alike. He will be sorely missed-from AA Facebook.
The place is emptying of hybrid giraffe: Mya-Lucy leaving in April for Dudley (companionship) and now Harriet to Twycross (empty enclosure). Can anyone discern the plan here?
I think they have a 2 or 3 left,the long term plan I believe is to bring a pure herd of Reticulated Giraffes!
A pair of Reticulated Giraffe arrived in June. The male is called Kimoni and came from Duisburg whilst the female is called Kiana and came from Cologne (photo on the parks Facebook page)
I am visiting there for the first time on Monday as part a short break in Norfolk and Suffolk, the main reason to be truthful to visit is to see 'an old friend' called Bud the ex breeding male White Rhino from Knowsley. I had a look at the AA map on the website, looks fairly good, any extra info from regular visitors appreciated, will be arriving for opening time on a day when the children will be in schools - bliss! (certainly no offence to the Zoochat youngsters on here who have respect for the animals )
My thoughts too. This is the worst time of year for School visits to zoos- late in the summer term seems a favourite time! I guess AA gets schools from Lowestoft and Ipswich visiting it, plus local primaries. Norwich is a bit far. Banham is in the middle of nowhere but probably gets Norwich schools and Thetford too, plus local primaries. Pleased to see also that they are concentrating on Reticulated Giraffe. Between AA, Colchester and Whipsnade, maybe now this race/species will become better represented in the UK, with exchanges between them possible in the future.
I'm not really a regular but the last three times I've visited I've been lucky enough to see the Aardvarks, they were being cleaned out in the first hour or so of the zoo opening and they're put outside so that the keepers can clean their indoor quarters. The routine may have changed but it's worth a punt for the chance of seeing them active.
Shorts - We went straight up to the Aardvarks at first opening, although they where in their darkened pen they where moving about so got a decent view of them which was good. Bele, Pertinax - Oh how correct you both where about school visits!!!!, however as usual with zoos and safari's, the early visitor gets the quiet periods. A brief summary of the visit. On the whole I was impressed with just about everything about AA. The whole place is clean, grass, plants and trees very well maintained. Enclosures again where all very clean and the signs and the information provided regarding each species informative and clear. We arrived 10 mins before opening time (9:30) and where let in straight away which was nice and made our way to the smaller enclosures first of all (see map on their website you will see what I mean). Of course all animals are interesting one way or another, but for me it was great to see Aardvarks, Porcupines (not seen them for years) and especially the Fossa. After one and a half hours viewing around here we went to take our trip into the largest section of AA. To take a trip into the White rhino, Giraffe, Zebra, Blesbok and Sitatunga costs an additional £15 each, but is very worth while in my opinion as you get driven into the 'paddock' by a keeper and you can chat and get all the information you require and more. The keeper who took us around was excellent and very knowledgeable. You get right up to the animals and for us it was great to see Bud the ex knowsley breeding rhino again, however he is not interested with the AA females yet, could be several reasons and factors for this.... (another dicussion in itself). Also we where lucky to see out for the first time a new baby Chapmans Zebra (until we noticed it was male it was unsexed until then, again getting so close we where able to do this). During this trip in the back of the open topped jeep we got to feed a giraffe (by the name of Snippet). She poked her head over the jeep and right over my shoulder to take carrots and greens off me, she was so delicate too, again a great experience to hand feed a giraffe in this way. This excursion and conversation with the keeper lasted just over half an hour (seemed like 5 mins to me!). when we pulled up at the end, we parked by the Somali Wild Ass who recognised the jeep and/or keeper and gave us a good view and also a listen to their great voices. After this was over and a quick coffee (decent place for a brew and looks Ok too for a bite to eat) we went for a walk around the rest of AA. However by now the school trips had started to invade and the tranquillity was lowering, hi-viz school youngsters zooming about in packs competing with the Ass's in terms of decibels at times, but give me school trips over 'free range kids' with parents any day as there is some kind of order to it. By half one we had finished and the last viewing was of the cheetahs, again a tidy, clean and good looking enclosure/exhibit. I was impressed with Africa Alive and recommend it to anyone local or holidaying in that neck of the woods, although it is an extra cost on top of the entry fee, paying to get close to the rhinos, giraffe & co is value for money and will be the highlight for many a person visiting.
