Chester Zoo Chester Zoo Discussion, Speculation & Questions 2018

Agree there is a fine balance which can be achieved. 'Mature' vegetation benefits all exhibits, as well as the animals. 'Overgrown' vegetation obscures the animals, and in some cases may also actually reduce the space available to the animals if it is too dense for their liking to pass through, so doesn't benefit them either. So there's a balance to be achieved somewhere. I think in Chester's case they do seem to allow overgrowth in some enclosures and of course if that's at the forefront, that obscures the whole enclosure too.

Elephants- why is that?. I noted on my last visit how the indoor Elephant area does make for difficult viewing. Never was a problem in the old house- but it is now.

 

I have no problem with vegetation in the enclosure, what I object to is vegetation running rampant outside the enclosure and preventing clear views of the animals.

 

My comment was about the lack of management within exhibits By this I mean what as happened to Prunning of the shrubs and thinning of other shrubs by taking out the runners from the base and as others have said Rampant growing this is purely laziness or lack of management.
It;s not just Chester many collections do the same build a exhibit fill it with plants then leave it to grow and grow and grow.

 

I'd be interested to know how far this is down to 'laziness' or mismanagement as some other users have suggested or whether it is very much deliberate. The Zoo seems to prefer visitors observing animals rather than being able to interact with them: e.g. several planters and a stand-off barrier were added in front of the indoor Mandrill enclosure about a decade ago to stop young visitors interacting with the (recently-deceased) male. I wonder how much this explains vegetation outside enclosures?

 

Interesting the mature members have more an issue of this......yes change can be scary but change can also be good.

Maybe put them in concrete enclosures and paint them like a rainforest, that why you could see the animals? There is enough animals on display at Chester that are easy to see, allowing for them to have some others that are harder to see for the good of the animals.

I miss the floral gardens at Chester, love them at Bristol but understand the decision to remove them.....maybe not to replace one with splash play area down the line as it sort of contradicts the removal in the first place.

 

I am mature enough to remember the time when Chester kept most of their cats and some monkeys on gravel (if they had access to the open air at all) and the apes on lawns: there are some vintage photos showing this in the our gallery. I'm sure that we don't want to go back to those days.
No-one should object to planting to provide backgrounds, for screening the sides of exhibits or to low planting forming barriers across the fronts of open enclosures to provide safe and attractive stand-offs. Neither should we object to planting inside enclosures to provide some security for nervous species, provided it is done to an appropriate degree and maintained properly. Of course there will always be a certain amount of debate about the right amount of cover in each circumstance.
I am curious to know which exhibits people think are overgrown. The Sumatran orangs? The Bornean orangs? The chimps? The cheetahs? I think I would nominate the islands for the mandrills and capuchins which I feel would benefit from some clearing of the shrubs and other vegetation near the moats. I would also remove some of the screen in the corner of the former banteng enclosure, now sometimes used for the onager stallion, to allow some distant views of the conure and lory breeding ranges. Eventually the new walk-through aviary in Islands will need some work too, but the birds did not have very long to settle in - and now it's closed to prevent avian 'flu, so that work will have to wait.
I think the zoo is sensitive about this: last year I remember how difficult it was to see the spectacled bear cub when it first emerged from the den, because even if it climbed to the top of a tree in the middle of the enclosure the trees nearer the front blocked the view. It didn't take long for those trees to be pruned so that visitors could have uninterrupted views.

 

I'm not against plants in a exhibit and yes I do support the fact that animals need area's were they can hide from the visitors as they do in real world it's just the fact that some of the exhibits in ALL collections are well over grown and with just a little bit of effort from the start this could easily have been avoided in most cases 15 minutes work with the pruners could improve so much.

 

The Monkey Islands at Chester are the only example that I think really needs some thinning. Elsewhere denser planting doesn't seem to have impeded any viewing that I can see- my other 'viewing' issues are more with the design of some of the other newer enclosures.

 

This photo was taken today

Chester Zoo Monkey Island Lion Tailed Macaque by Waddi posted 1 Apr 2018 at 5:08 PM

 

Fantastic.....maybe someone in authority at the zoo has been following this thread?

 

That's the island that I think needs no extra attention

 

Are you sure this is Chester? The people who work there are so lazy and lack interest. I can't think why they'd have bothered...

 

Posted April 1st- another joke?

 

Only just joined and very new at this......
Wondering how many tapirs are at chester zoo.......? Tia

 

Currently 6.

3 Brazilian 2.1
3 Malaysian 1.2

 

Nice bit of generalisation there! Things like this don't exactly present ZooChat in a good light to the zoo community.

 

I think our Hylobati friend was being ironic ...

 

Off topic I know, and apologies for it, but does there happen to problem with how the zoo community perceives ZooChat?

 

Well according to I believe @bongorob there was a time when a zoo didn't recieve an import. I don't remember exactly what he said but I think it was mentioned in last year's thread.