Kiwi in Zoos

In light of the Smithsonian National's latest hatching, I'm curious to know which zoos outside New Zealand also hold kiwi? Googling suggests there are some dozen zoos with specimens, including San Diego. None in Europe tho I notice

 

Hi! here in Argentina I´ve never seen kiwis neither in Buenos Aires zoo, Mendoza zoo, in the Tatu Carreta zoo (Cordoba) or Temaikén, but I hope some day be able to travel and see one or they bring some here.
I´ve check for The North Island Kiwi and apparently isn´t any outside New Zeland.
I recommend you this site https://app.isis.org/abstracts/abs.asp, althougth is not updated but is a good sorce to find out were they kept the species you were looking for.

Anyway, i´m curious, I ´ll like to know how kiwis are kept, what requirements they have, enrichment ideas, etc.

Sorry if this was not the idea, but maybe would be interesting to talk about kiwi managment to encourage some institutions from Europe or other parts of the world to include kiwis in their collections

 

In Europe:

Berlin zoo
Frankfurt Zoo
Walsrode
Antwerp Zo
Avifauna

 

It's been several years since Los Angeles has had Kiwis.

 

Although Antwerp has a Kiwi, it has no added value :S. They put it in an aviary with normal day and night cycle. So the first visitor that has seen it still has to come.

 

The one at Antwerp is mythical amongst dutch/belgian zoofans, most of us doubt there was ever one there...
Avifauna only recently acquired their animals and house them in a nocturnal exhibit. Apparantly they are decently visable there

I believe Frankfurt now only breeds them when they know they can get rid of any offspring beforehand. Shame that noone seems to be willing to give them a decent nocturnal exhibit. Can't wait to go to Avifauna soon and see them

 

A Kiwi has hatched at Berlin zoo two weeks ago. I was at the Zoo last weekend, visitors can see the young in its sleeping box.

Stuttgart Zoo has kept them in the Past; after the Kiwi house was closed, the Kiwis were send back to Frankfurt, where they came from.

 

The Columbus Zoo here in Ohio exhibits North Island Brown Kiwis as well.

 

I'd love to see a kiwi! I missed out on seeing them in San Diego ack in 2001...

Any chance that if there are more succesful breedings, that we'l be seeing kiwi in any UK zoos? (Hope so!)

 

Kiwis were displayed in the Clore at London Zoo some years ago in the Nocturnal section and were visible . Not certain what happened to them .

I suspect that if a UK Zoo decided that they wanted to display Kiwis they would have no great problem obtaining some .

 

I would second that, the last place to hold them was London zoo, when in 1986 3 birds were sent to London from Wellington zoo, to join the single bird that was already in the collection, one bird died that same year.
1986 - 1/0/2
1987 - 0/0/2
1988 - 2/0
1989 - 1/0
And the last male was sent away in 1990.

Edinburgh zoo also held a kiwi, in the 1960's

 

Getting a Kiwi will not be hard, as mentioned before Frankfurt only breeds them when they know they can send them somewhere. So if an UK zoo decides they want Kiwi's they probably can get them from there.

 

I think kiwis would make a great addition to the new Night Life area of the Clore. In many ways they are the perfect species for ZSL, small and unique in the UK.

 

Then it is very sad that so strange interesting and endangered animal is so rare in Europe where many nocturnal houses are built.
And what about Gondwanaland in Leipzig...kiwi would absolutely fit ..do they plan to keep kiwi there???

 

My mistake then - from what little I could find, Europe appeared to have no kiwis, which wouldn't surprise me since I personally think we're a bit lacking in antipodean species Good to know that we do have some kiwi in Europe tho, since they're a species I'd love to see one day.

I too find it a bit strange that Frankfurt would only breed kiwi if they could rehome the offspring - as they're an unusual species, I personally would have thought that they'd be a nice, quirky addition to any zoo with a nocturnal house. They're the sort of creature I could see zoos such as Edinburgh, Chester or London getting.

Thanks all, that's my query answered with some interesting extra info

 

If they want to keep Kiwi's in the Clore they need to create some larger exhibit as the current night enclosures are simply too small. Next to that Kiwi's are shy animals, so when it's very noisy it's very likely the animal will not be visible. So for an average visitor you ll have a big enclosure with nice plants but most of the time no bird.
So from our freak perspective they are very interesting but for normal visitors or conservation perspective (New Zealand are doing fine on their own) they are not. So you ll have an animal with relatively high costs (large nocturnal enclosure with an insect eating bird) and less added value.

 

I swear there is or was kiwis at twycross zoo.