Uploaded the first photos in the De Evenaar - Eekhoorn Experience Gallery because I visited this small collection for the first time today. The Eekhoorn Experience ( = Squirrel Experience )is part of garden-center De Evenaar in Etten-Leur. In a nicely decorated bamboo-gardenof about 1 hectare about a dozen enclosures are places and the collection contains mainly squirrels ( 11 different species at the moment ) but also some lovebirds, parakeets, conures and pheasants ( most of them mutations ) have found a good home here. Entrance is free but you have to go through the garden-center to reach the enctrance of the Experience but of course you are not forced to buy anything in the center. I had been once before at the garden-center earlier this year but during the winter-time the Eekhoorn Experience is closed for visitors so today was my first visit. As said, 11 squirrel-species are kept, among them some ( very ) rarely seen species : - Sciurotamias davidianus - Sciurus lis - Sciurus granatensis ssp hoffmanni ( only kept at 2 other European collections ) - Tamias striatus ( kept at 18 European collections but the only onces in the Netherlands ) - Callosciurus finlaysonii ( unk. ssp ) ( one UK-collection has ssp ferrugineus ) - Callosciurus prevostii - Tamiops swinhoe - Dremomys pernyi ( not seen, were hidding in the nest-boxes - only 1 other European collection keeping it ) -Tamasciurus hudsonicus - Cynomys ludovicianus - Urocitellus richardsonii - only 4 other European collections The Eekhoorn Experience is a really nice place with a lot of information-signs about squirrels, a very nice collection, good enclosures and for every squirrel-lover a must to visit, for the "normal" zoo / animal-lover a recommendation !
that's a really nice collection of squirrels! But you only have photos of one species in the gallery. Were the other squirrels not being cooperative?
Oh yes, they were but I had only little time yesterday-evening. Will surtainly upload photos of the other ones later.
Something I forgot to tell in my little review of this place is that there are a number of automates where you cab buy special squirrel-food to feed the squirrels. Result is, that most squirrels are extremely tame and come direct to the wire when you comes near the enclosure - which make taking photos not always easy.
Next to the eleven species mentioned above by @vogelcommando, rock squirrel (Spermophilus variegatus) is also kept at De Evenaar at the moment.
I visited De Evenaar this afternoon and there are some changes in the collection compared to my visit last year. Common rock squirrel seems to be gone. New are two subspecies of variegated squirrel: atrirufus (saw two in an indoor enclosure and two in the former common rock squirrel enclosure) and rigidus (saw a very nervous one). The eastern chipmunks have moved indoor and their former enclosure serves as a second one for Hoffmann's red-tailed squirrels.
The black-and-white variegated squirrel was signed as rigidus, but it's a dorsalis. Maybe De Evenaar used Wainwright's "Mammals of Costa Rica", which proved to be wrong based on my encounters with both subspecies in the wild (in the drawing dorsalis is labelled as rigidus, and viceversa).
A lot of breeding at De Evenaar . Sofar young of Hudson's ( see video-clip ), Hoffmann's, Penney, Prevost and Swinhoe's squirrels : https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=2755034564769143
Hi, I am preparing for a trip around Holland and try to choose the route. Zootierliste lists Japanese Squirrel, Black-Headed Parrot / Black-Capped Caique, Eastern Chipmunk, Finlayson's Squirrel and Perny's Long-Nosed Squirrel at Etten-Leur (de Eekhoorn Experience In De Evenaar). Are they there and where and when can they be best seen?
