last i heard australia zoo was trying to import elephants themselves. with there 50+ year olds, they don't have time to wait for the other zoos to start running out of room. perth are in trouble if they can't breed their young elephants soon. tricia could easily die soon leaving them with a elephant pair, of which one is so far failing to become pregnant. the idea of taronga thai elephants going on breeding loan to perth is a very real one...
sorry nigel i just don't much buy any of this, if it really is the zoos excuse. firstly, whilst i know your very proud of auckland's elephant walks and by all means sounds like they make the most of it - its nothing unique. melbourne have been walking kapah for years and i've even seen keepers riding all their female elephants. australia zoo walks theirs too. in fact, bar the males and asians at dubbo, every single elephant in the regions zoos is managed under a free-contact policy. they are just as docile, walkable and responsive as the two elephants at auckland. secondly, the three zoos (melb, auck, syd) went elephant "shopping" in thailand and they ended up, due to the court cases, having years to select their animals. taronga and melbourne managed to find seven totally docile, fertile and workable females. lets not pretend that poor ol' auckland got shafted and offered an aggressive old **** of an elephant - they wouldn't have. i'm sure it had a lot more to do with this. it was going to cost auckland a lot of money to build a new elephant exhibit to accommodate not only another female but a bull elephant as well. the whole fiasco was already getting lots of bad press and auckland just bailed out. but to get back to my point - auckland's elephants arn't special. and there is nothing saying australian elephants won't be sent to new zealand for this reason.
They didn't need to build a new exhibit for females, the enclosure was designed to hold three Asian females, it has three identical stalls... The middle one currently is empty... They would need to build bull accomodations... I didn't know this was ever on the cards..? I tend to think that Auckland is very happy with the situation they have at the moment and they would only change it if everything was perfect, it wasn't so they didn't...
i reckon auckland and monarto are about round 3 for new elephants. taronga and melbourne got in first, next id say will be australia zoo and perth possibly as an import syndicate or through sourcing zoo brad calves,,,,,,and then monarto with Africans maybe and Auckland to get a few more to replace their ageing oldest female...
Barring a sudden death I don't see anything changing at Auckland for about 20 years till Kashin dies (shes in her late 30s/early 40s at the moment I think)...
i agree.and bar anything changing i doubt either Auckland or Monarto will put their hands up for elephants within the next ten years.
I see their is something post about the kakapo, but are they kakapos (and maybe kakas?) in auckland zoo? Or in any zoo at New Zealand?
Kakas in Auckland Zoo These were on display in the NZ aviary , which is closed for reconstruction of the new themed area . The young kaka was very friendly and used to land on peoples shoulders as they were walking through the walk through aviary . Alot of people mistook him as being a kea when he did that ! His mother was alot more wary of humans . I dont think that kakapo will be on display in any NZ zoos for quite some time yet -- my guess that the first one will be Mount Bruce Bird sanctuary
Kaka vs kakapo I wouldnt even consider kaka as "rare" . I have seen them in the wild a few times . Kakapo on the other hand would be in the top category of very rare birds in NZ , and possibly the world (?)
