I think everyone has gotten the basic concept of how the voting structure and rules for these finals rounds go, so no need to rehash those points - though naturally if I think people are bending the rules a bit I'll wade in It's a pretty good combination of categories in this one, methinks - BIRDS and TROPICAL FORESTS. A lot that can be said on both sides, I think, and I hope for a fairly lively discussion. So, let's get on with it, shall we?
At the moment (I may change my vote ) I'm giving it 3/ 2 to London based on the greater number of overall bird species they have and those native to the tropical rainforests of the Neotropics, Africa, Australia and South-East Asia. But... judging by the zoochat gallery I actually much prefer the display of birds / aviaries at Cotswold in their walled garden to the aviaries at London which are not very impressive at all.
I'm going 3-2 CWP for now, purely on presentation. Both organisations have some rather juicy tropical species and rather nice birds, but CWP displays them with a certain elegance the ZSL collections don't manage. Worth noting I didn't see the bird house on my last visit to London so my perspective might be slightly skewed.
I think I'll change my vote to reflect the same too, presentation isn't everything but it certainly is an important factor in a zoo.
It should be noted that you should be looking at the entire Tropical Forests category, not merely those birds which fit the category!
So we are talking about all tropical forest taxa including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and inverts ?
Birds I think is fairly even, but ZSL walks it on Tropical Forest mammals, it has to be 3-2 ZSL for me!
Yes; as I have already clarified to you a few times, the definitions of the categories have not changed, only the number in play within a match and it's worth providing a reminder here to all participants that you *must* consider both categories in your judgement - and that I strongly urge people to post the reasoning behind their votes, both for the sake of promoting discussion and (hopefully) more prolific voting, and to ensure as much transparency as possible.
On birds, I think the competition is even leaning towards ZSL. On tropical forests, however, ZSL has much stronger cards with their Asian elephants, Indian, rhinos, gorillas, chimpanzees, pygmy hippo, and my favorite animal okapis. I'm missing those big names in CWP. I know there are different thoughts on the importance of the big ABC animals, I think if the zoo wants to play in the champions league it should exhibit a decent bunch of the larger icon mammals. So it's a 4-1 for me.
I'd say that the Indian rhinoceros is more a grassland species in terms of habitat rather than a tropical forest one but then again I'm not an expert on rhinos by any means.
I'm also no expert on where how the different habitats can be distinguished. Personally, I would view the riverine forest under the tropical forest category, but I can imagine it might be different. Regardless of the Indian rhino. The tropical forest collection of ZSL is much larger and often quite well exhibited compared to CWP.
It does not really matter about the rhino, how about Sumatran Tiger, Bongo, Babirusa, warty pig, red river hog, Aye Aye, most of the rainforest house at London, Sloth Bear, several of the monkeys in gorilla Kingdom. Ignoring duplicates, all I can see Cotswold have to throw back is Lowland Tapir and Binturong really as far as mammals go, perhaps a couple of lemur species. This is a win for London, by how much is the debate really.
If exhibitry of birds is being considered, London have one of the best penguin exhibits in the UK and Whipsnade's is much better than Cotswold (and they have a large group of Rockhoppers, always a bonus).
Well... in terms of tropical forest mammals you missed out the black and white colobus, siamang, emperor tamarin, asian short clawed otter (*cringe*), pygmy marmoset, two toed sloth. Then you have those "couple of" lemur species which include some truly rare and beautiful species like the greater bamboo lemur, grey mouse lemur and crowned sifaka as well as the boring old ring tailed lemur.
I said I was ignoring duplicates, London has Colobus, otters, sloth, loads of Tamarins and other primates in the rainforest house, white cheeked gibbon, and ring tailed lemur. I did forget sifaka and Greater bamboo lemur, but it is still ZSL way ahead
@pipaluk if you stated that ZSL is 'way ahead' on tropical forest and on birds 'fairly even' why do you give ZSL only a small victory of 3-2 and no wider margin score? Like me
I'm not sure yet, I certainly think 4-1 ZSL is more accurate than a win for Cotswold, I'm going to have to look a bit closer, I'm not sure what the difference is on Tropical Forest Reptiles Amphibians & Birds, though I know Cotswold won't win those by enough to wipe out the mammals win for ZSL. If ZSL win several of those too I may change to 4-1
Yes, I suppose it does, but every vote is ultimately a subjective one and I still haven't made my mind up. I think London has greater diversity of birds and tropical species and it is the only one of these two zoos that I have visited. But aesthetically and in terms of its direction ZSL leaves a lot to be desired whereas Cotswold seems like a very charming looking zoo.
Cotswold is a very good zoo, no question, but it is the categories that should determine who wins, not which zoo is better overall! I am one of ZSL's biggest critics on here, but in these categories even I think it wins, at least fairly comfortably.
