First birth of the year. A male Mishmi takin was born to the herd on 3rd March. Other news is that a chute has been built to connect both forest reindeer enclosures.
The male takin calf, had it's leg broken by it's first time mother, but the leg has been put in a cast and according to the RZSS blog, the calf is responding well. The 2 lynx kittens born last year have been deposited at Drayton Manor, the parents have been observed mating again. Female satyr and Temminck's tragopan have arrived at the park from Dudley. RZSS Blog | All the current happenings at Edinburgh Zoo, Highland Wildlife Park and RZSS.
Highland Wildlife Park's rare Amur tigers mating BBC Scotland - 10th April, 2013 The Highland Wildlife Park is hopeful that a litter of rare Amur tiger cubs could be born there later this year. The Royal Zoological Society of Scotland (RZSS) said the park's pair of adult tigers have been mating since January. Three dens have been built away from public view in the tigers' enclosure where female Dominika can give birth to the cubs, if she falls pregnant. Dominika is one of a litter of three tigers born at the park in 2009. Her siblings are at other zoos. Dominika shares an enclosure with a male called Marty, who arrived last year from a zoo in the Czech Republic. Up to 500 Amur tigers, also known as Siberian tigers, are thought to survive in the wild in the birch forests of eastern Russia. The gestation period of Amur tigers, the world's largest big cat, is between 103 to 110 days. Females usually give birth to a litter of two to three cubs, but have been known to give birth to as many as six. Dominika's mother Sasha was put down in 2011 after her health started to fail and she began exhibiting odd behaviour as she got older. Sasha's long-time mate Yuri was put down in 2010. Douglas Richardson, head of living collections for the Highland Wildlife Park, which is situated near Aviemore, said Marty and Dominika were the right age to start breeding. He said: "While we are hopeful that Dominika will become pregnant this year it is currently too early to tell if this is the case. "Three secluded cubbing dens have been created for her in different parts of her enclosure and her behaviour is monitored closely for any changes that may indicate an impending birth. "However, due to the more private nature of big cats and the fact that Dominika has not given birth before, we may not know for certain until shortly before the cubs are born."
The blog reports that the wolverines could be in their new enclosure by the end of the month; The last major stage of the wolverine enclosure construction has been completed, with the stringing of just over four miles of electric fencing cable inside the enclosure perimeter fence; the whole area is just over 1.6 acres, which may make it the world’s largest wolverine enclosure. There is still some testing and tweaking to do, but we are confident we will have wolverines living at the Highland Wildlife Park by the end of April.
The wolverines will be arriving at the park, this coming Tuesday (30th), but will be offshow to let them settle in. The male takin calf has had it's cast removed and is being monitored.
Was at the park yesterday and had a wonderful day as usual. Sadly they had a notice up to announce that the baby of one of the Japanese Snow monkey's had died. The notice was informing people that during the mourning period (around 6 days) the mother carries the baby around with her and would be removed once she abandoned it. So terrible sad. Wonderful to see that the park allow the troop to follow the natural behaviours at such a time.
Lifted from the blog: An elk calf was also born last night at the Highland Wildlife Park, our female capercaillie has laid four eggs and the snowy owl and the great grey owl as both sitting tight on their nests – so watch this space! The wolverine now have full access to their new enclosure and are using every bit of it, including climbing the trees.
Lifted from the blog: At the Highland Wildlife Park one of the female macaques, Angara, gave birth last week and both mother and baby are well. Angara is the dominant female in the macaque troop and this is her second baby in the same number of years. The female capercaillie has laid 10 eggs so far and the Satyr tragopan has laid three. Four female water voles also arrived in our northerly park and have been divided into breeding pairs with the males. The offspring will be released into the wild at the end of the summer as part of the Trossachs Water Vole Project. Population segmentation and the need to diversify genes means that wild caught water voles from various locations around Scotland are brought to the Highland Wildlife Park; the adults and offspring are then released in the Trossachs at the end of the summer. The Highland Wildlife Park has shown great success in creating and caring for breeding pairs.
The park have announced this morning that Dominika has given birth to two cubs. Marty is still on show, but Dominika and the cubs, born at end of last week, will be off show for a couple of weeks. How amazing that an Amur Tigress born at the park has gone on to give birth there. Can't wait for the cubs to make their debut, and yet another thumbs up for their set up up there.
When I visited in mid April, they tried to get the tigers in their holding areas temporarily to set up for the feeding demonstration. The female would not go in so they finally gave up and just threw the meat over the fence. The keeper said he suspected she was being finnicky because she might be pregnant. This confirms it.
From the new RZSS Supporters email: Wow! Just Wow! The Snowy Owls obviously benefit from being in their new enclosure, and the Pandas didn't waste any time!
Pic of the cubs from FB page https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-frc1/1017424_10151596400041708_1041764596_n.jpg
That is one hugely impressive list of births, first breedings at the park for musk ox, white lipped deer, red panda and great grey owl. For me the most important birth is the markhor, hopefully a few, if not all females amongst them.
