the Malayan Tapir at Taronga has moved to Hunter Valley Zoo: https://taronga.org.au/news/2015-09-01/‘gentle-giant’-berani-moves-new-home
basically, the zoo is redeveloping the Big Cat area into a "Sumatran village" (i.e. a heavily-themed Sumatran tiger area) and a lot of animals which lived in that part of the zoo are being shuffled off to smaller zoos to make room.
Hmmh. Will Berani and the other animals return, after the "Sumatran village" is completed? Or does "Sumatran village" just mean: "A huge tiger exhibit with a lot of pseudo-ethno stuff and educational elements, but no other animals around?"
someone more familiar with the plans than I will probably be able to give a better answer, but I suspect exactly how you describe it. As for the animals which have left, the Malayan and Brazilian tapirs definitely won't return (although potentially if an import ever gets under way then the latter species may re-appear at the zoo somewhere, just not the same animal), the snow leopards won't return, the fennecs won't (but they still have other fennecs), and the dholes are dead. There might be some other animals I've forgotten.
@Chidonias: Thank you very much for your reply/info. So sad. The disapearing of the species at Taronga continues and it will become a more and more boring zoo (although with probably the best view of any zoo in the world). Another reason not to revisit it and to rate Melbourne Zoo higher...
I've just been having a scratch around for a plan, but the only thing I can find currently is a one-sentence description, namely: "Sumatran Tiger Adventure An Indonesian-themed exhibit where visitors can get close to the mysterious Sumatran Tigers, and learn why choosing sustainable palm oil products can help preserve their native habitat."
Billabong now has Cheetah, having imported two males from South Africa. Cool cats a coup for Billabong zoo | Port Macquarie News
the 2013 cub has been exported recently to Canada, so now there are only three Polar Bears at Sea World. http://www.zoochat.com/24/polar-bear-cub-born-320787/index2.html Perth Zoo now has a pair again.
Taronga's lions have all been moved to the Hunter Valley Zoo (which did not have lions previously). So the former zoo has been removed from the listings, and the latter zoo has been added.
Darling Downs Zoo received three male Capybara this week from Adelaide Zoo. There are now three zoos in Australia with Capybara (the third being Altina).
I just had a look through your list and there are 2 things you may want to check out: 1. Tree shrews: The enclosure at Melbourne Zoo is no longer in use and the sign has been taken down, indicating that they may have died (MZ only had 1 pair and they don't have a particularly long lifespan) 2. White rhinos: I'm not 100% sure, but I'm 75% sure National Zoo (Canberra) have 2 or 3 off display (I was talking to a keeper there about it last year).
1. I'll check that out. Melbourne has only had one tree shrew for a while. It is/was only six years old, and the larger tree shrews have lifespans of around ten years. 2. do'h, how did that get overlooked!? There is a thread from 2014 about the rhinos imminent arrival (http://www.zoochat.com/24/rhinos-arrive-next-month-358944/) but they apparently didn't arrive then so there must have been some hold-up. The rhinos instead seem to have arrived this year, but I don't know how many there are (originally it was meant to be three males - two from Hamilton and one from Orana). The only news on the forum about this was an apparently-missed-by-everyone comment in the 2015 news thread (http://www.zoochat.com/24/national-zoo-aquarium-canberra-news-2015-a-397695/index2.html) where Sunbear12 said "A comment on Facebook from the zoo mentions that the rhinos have arrived but are currently off display while their enclosure is under construction." That was in June; I had a flick back through their Facebook and the first mention of them actually being at the zoo was March 2015, so they have been there a while. (Also from their Facebook, siamang arriving soon at National: the enclosure is being built).
the Melbourne tree shrew has indeed gone, so just the Adelaide individual left. It probably won't be too long before that one dies as well and an entire order of mammals will be lost from Australian zoos. The rhinos at National Zoo arrived in April 2014 (so almost two years ago! - the "Rhinos arrive next month" thread was dead right), and they are the three males as reported - one from Orana and two from Hamilton. I don't keep track of rhino names so I don't know which specific males they are.
When I was in SA earlier this year there was an exhibit for tree shrew at Gorge as well, although I didn't see the individual. Not sure if that's still there?
I was looking through this list today and found a handful of corrections: *Mogo now has Binturong *The deer at Birdland are Fallow Deer, not Spotted *Puma and Serval have now been off display at the National Zoo for a long time - not sure if they're still there or not Out of interest, I decided to follow this list through and rank the different zoos by the number of exotic mammal species displayed. Obviously the domestics lead to some inconsistencies (most out, llamas/alpacas in), but the results were interesting. Melbourne was the clear winner with 37, followed somewhat surprisingly by Adelaide on 34 and then Western Plains on 33. At this point Mogo and Altina appear with 31 and then Taronga (its recent thinning taking its toll) and the National Zoo on 29. Next were Perth (28), Halls Gap (27), Monarto (24), Werribee (21) and Darling Downs (20). Gorge and Hunter Valley were both on 15, Tasmania Zoo and Mansfield (helped by 4 deer species) on 14, Crocodylus on 13, Australia Zoo and Queensland Zoo on 12, and Symbio and Zoodoo on 11. Of the minnows, Wings (6), Shoalhaven (5), Rockhampton (5) and Billabong (5) were the only serious contenders, and the rest were very much dribs and drabs. An interesting exercise - especially to see the private zoos equalling or outpacing the government ones (although of course given the big private zoos barely do any natives, birds or reptiles, the government zoos would far outstrip them on total species).
thanks for that. I found some photos of the deer and they are indeed fallows so I'll correct that. Is the binturong actually at Mogo still? It arrived in Feb 2014 so I had it on the previous version of the list, but then it seemed to disappear (it never got listed on the census at all). I'll see what I can find out about the National Zoo puma and serval.
