Dudley Zoological Gardens Dudley Zoological Gardens in 2017

Impressive plans. Looking forward to seeing the new species and pleased to hear that some of the (in my opinion) wasted space in the chimpanzee viewing area is being put to good use. I'm glad the squirrel enclosure is being revamped but would have liked them to retain red squirrel as well as introducing the Prevosts. Good to hear that they are also improving visitor facilities - whilst I'm not a fan of children's play areas within zoos I appreciate that they may improve the overall experience for families.

 

Honestly, I think these plans are absolutely AMAZING!

• The Naked Mole-Rats would look GREAT inside the Chimpanzee house, considering that there isn't an actual nocturnal house at Dudley and not to mention they did use to house a species of Monitor inside one of the Chimp houses at Twycross (or maybe that was the Bonobos, IDK).
• I would've expected for the Binturongs to be kept in the same enclosure as the otters (like they are at the BWCP, considering also that they are from the same habitat), but either way I don't mind them being in the area with the Yellow mongooses. On top of that, I've always been expecting DZG to go into keeping Binturongs for about sometime now, and just hearing about them arriving next year has made me EXCITED!!!
• Prevost's Squirrels are also among one of the other species I've been wanting to see at Dudley, even though this will mean having to remove Red squirrels from the collection (like they did at BWCP & Drayton Manor), in order to make way for the new enclosure, which I'll admit will be sad because I loved seeing the Red squirrels in their enclosure (Even if the exhibit itself is a bit crap) but again I think the Prevost's squirrels will make a wonderful addition as well.
• Contination of the farmyard revamp=About time to, can't wait to see what they will do to this area, actually hoping for more alpacas and maybe some donkeys....
• Extending the camel paddock towards the adventure playground=Again, who needs that play area when you've got others around the zoo, so why not just remove that and make the paddock even bigger, next thing you know bring in MORE camels!
• Completing work on the Parrot aviaries=Again, about time to!
• Viewing platform for Asiatic lions=Now, I can actually see why they couldn't get this completed this year, because of the wet summer. *facepalms* But hopefully this year they can try again and hopefully get the platform area open!
• Extending the tapir paddock=Sounds good, but what else are you going to do with the maras and capybaras that are also in this paddock, and are you adding another species into that exhibit? (I'm sorry to be rude, but I'm just curious about this one).

And well, apart from all that I think these plans sound great, and I CANNOT WAIT to come back to DZG next year and see these new additions for myself!

 

I think the original article mentioned 'improving' rather than 'extending' the tapir paddock. Personally, I think it's already a reasonable size but rather drab and dull.

 

True, I think the only thing that they will have to change is the horrid outdated fencing around the paddock, and maybe replace it with a type of fencing like they have for the anteater paddock or insert viewing windows (Maybe?).

Also I only just found out the Red squirrel cages are empty now so I'm assuming they've already left (probably returned to their natural habitat, or to another collection), so I guess that means they no longer hold the species.