They had a large breeding group of Giraffe which were thought to be pure Rothschild. Unfortunatly it was recently discovered that they were not pure and they are currently in the process of breaking up the herd. 2 females at Chester (Kelly and Faye) were born at Belfast. As they have now been found not to be pure Faye's calf Margret and Kelly's calf Molly will not be allowed to breed. Both Margret and Molly are leaving Chester in the near future. Faye is now dead and Kelly will stay at Chester for now as she is pregnant. Once Kelly's calf has been born she and the baby will leave Chester as well.
I have no idea sorry. I only found out today from another Zoochat thread that she was pregnant and the other 2 were leaving shortly. Chester is to get more females soon though. A giraffes gestation is 15 months so it might be a long wait!
To do with Belfast zoos zebras, I think they have a male, two females and a new born, female zebra foal called Ember. Don't hold me to this as I may be wrong.
We currently have 6 zebras. A male, female and foal in our mixed paddock and three old females in with a male blesbok and a male nile lechwe.
Hi Meant to reply to this ages ago, but here is some more of the info you require! As mentioned we have 6 Zebra and 6 Giraffe of varying ages The Zebras are currently split into two groups following friction / sexual frustration from our stallion shortly before and after the birth our recent foal In the breeding group kept in with our Giraffe are Blake the stallion who is from Fota and is just over 5 years old, Ellen (from Chester I think) who is 7 and ember who is 4 weeks old. The three elderly mares who have currently been ousted from the herd, are princess who is 22, waif who is also 22 and sandy who is 27, princess and waif are from a collection apparently in woking (??) and as according to their arks sheets they share the same birthday I think this might be a dealer so there exact lineage is dubious! Our giraffes are Erin who is 13, and her son moon who is 2 next month (he was recently castraeted and is due to move to south lakes soon) Niamh she's 10 and her daughter cotton who is 2 on sunday, Maeve who is 6 and Neja who is 2 and a half. Neja is our only 100% pure bred Rothschilds giraffe and is from Aalborg zoo, the others are Belfast born and bred, whilst it is likely that the others are pure there is a discrepency with the bloodlines and given the size of the rothschilds population it is not worth the risk of just assuming they are pure, all but Neja are due to leave Belfast in the future (no dates yet) and a pure Rothschilds Bull is due to arrive from Fota later this year.
It seems that the 2 breeding females Erin and Niamh remain with their respective calves. Also, the planned transfer of a pure-bred bull Rothschildt's has not been realised to date. Is this a correct assumption? What happened to female Maeve and the male Ballyearl (born March 2006)? Were they transferred too to a non-breeding situation?
Niamh and Erin do indeed remain with their calves Ballycotton (female) and Ballymoon (castrated male) Maeve is still in house, Ballyearl was relocated to another collection. The bull giraffe is yet to be transferred to Belfast as further EEP recommendations have been recieved, but this should all come together soon, full details to be released when it is confirmed and the paperwork is in place, the disbanding of the current giraffe is not an immediate issue as the bull giraffe is not yet of breeding age. Keep an eye on the zoos facebook or here for updates
I happily can wait ... I am sure it will come together soon. None to soon as I hope that Belfast Zoo can once again augment new generations of rothschildis to us all. I would think that the set up will be 1.3 or 1.4 (more the former than the latter).
it is just MHO that the exisiting giraffe should be DNA tested to ascertain genetical purity, and additional moves be based on those findings but it is just my feelings, reviewing the gene line and observations of experienced giraffe keepers that have seen the belfast herd
Is there any giraffes or zebras to come into the zoo in the future??? If so, will the giraffes be purely Rothschild's??
1:2 Rothschilds arrived from Fota, Dublin and Givskud, Denmark at the start of the year. See earlier threads
Does anyone know of any new arrivals coming into the zoo in the next few months... Was at the zoo last weekend and saw 2 new ostriches in the exhibit opposite the giraffe and zebra paddock and another large Ostrich-like bird in the Giant Anteater ebclosure. I also saw a zebra down in the bottom part of the zoo (avenue animal walk) in with the blesbok and sitatunga. Why?? And when will the mountain tea house be ready?? Also, one Last question! At the farm we ( me and my cousin) saw a new 'enclosure' being built... i think! What will be held in here???
