Mountain View Conservation & Breeding Centre Mountain View Conservation + Breeding Centre

The Mountain View Conservation and Breeding Centre is a great little place that is unknown to almost everyone here in British Columbia, Canada. It has an impressive (yet small) collection of rare and endangered animals, and is not open to the public. However, it is possible to book guided tours around the closed facilities, but they only take bookings at least 48 hours in advance.

An example of what they have: Aardwolf, Amur Leopard Cat, Fossa, Brazilian Ocelot, Caracal, Bat-Eared Fox, Cheetah, Fishing Cat, Geoffrey's Cat, Gordon's Cat, Indian Desert Cat, African Hunting Dog, Painted Cat, Rusty Spotted Cat, Pallas Cat, Serval, Sand Cat, and Temminck's Golden Cat. Those are just the rare carnivores...

They have some cuvier, mhorr and slender-horned gazelles, which they list as all being extinct in the wild, as well as malayan and mountain tapirs, scimitar-horned oryx, etc.

There is a lot more information on their website: mtnviewconservation.org/ for those who are interested in rare creatures.

 

They have had their male mountain tapir for a while, but the female is relativly new from Either Columbia or LA zoo.

 

After looking at the site, they have a very impressive collection!

Indian Rhino, Mountain Tapir, Masai Giraffe and Cape Buffalo all stand out for me, as well as the large amount of carnivores that you previously mentioned.

The guided tours seem interesting as well.

 

Is it privately owned..? If so by who..?

 

A couple bought 200 acres of land and founded the centre in 1986, and it has never been open to the public in terms of being able to just walk in the front entrance. There have always been bookings at $30 per individual for an hour and a half tour. The website has lots of information on the place...

 

Do they still have the fish-eating addax antelopes? Let me see-no, they changed that part...:
Mountain View - Addax Antelope
Too bad they don't have the pygmy hippos anymore-the mixed species exhibit of bongos and them was really interesting.

 

Sun Wukong: I see from this and other postings that you've visited Mountain View, as well as the Vancouver Aquarium and the Greater Vancouver Zoo. Did you at one time swing through Canada on a zoo-going vacation? It's great that you had the opportunity to come to North America.

 

@snowleopard: Yes, I have visited Canada several times-and besides of the zoos/aquariums You mentioned, I also visited the Montreal biodome, Toronto zoo and two or three smaller zoos in Quebec as well as in Alberta. Wish to repeat that another time.

 

@Sun Wukong: I plan to visit the Montreal Biodome next summer, as well as the Toronto Zoo. What are your thoughts in regards to those two establishments, and did you visit Granby Zoo in Quebec? Did you see the Calgary Zoo or Edmonton's Valley Zoo?

 

I liked the Toronto zoo and considered parts of the Biodome as well-made (though I was there in 2001, so things surely have changed there). I have not been to the other three zoos You mentioned-yet.

 

Sun Wukong if you are going back th Canada the African lion safari park in Rockton might be worth a visit they have an outstanding breeding herd on Asian elephants and have bred quite a few calfs there.

 

Thanks, I'll keep that in mind.

 

Hi guys, I volunteered at Mountain View a few summers ago working with the carnivores, primates and hoofstock...its a truly amazing place. In terms of African Lion Safari though I dont reccomend it, although they have a large herd of elephants they keep them in an almost circus type environment which is very barren and mostly concrete. They do parade them through the park and take them to a small lake where they bathe but there are usually way to many people around to actually see anything. The rest of the park is ok, the bird and primate exhibits are very lacking and in the summer months you move through the safari park at around 2 miles/hour (make sure you have air conditioning in your car, or take the bus around). If you do get out near Toronto I think the Toronto Zoo is far better. It has a much wider variety of animals and is currently undergoing many improvements to the Eurasian and Australian exhibits. There is also a buzz about them possibly building a China exhibit and getting some pandas, snub-nosed monkeys etc as well as creating a Madagascar exhibit there (there are currently no lemurs at all!). Over all its a nice place with lots to see and you are much more likely to see animals there than at African Lion Safari. If you want to know about any smaller zoos in the area such as Jungle Cat World, Twin Valley Zoo or Zooz let me know and I can tell you about them too

 

Snub-nosed Monkeys?!?! (Rushes to the nearest travel agency to get a ticket to Toronto)...

 

I agree with you Torontos collection is a better one than the African Lion Safari, Their herd of Asain elephants is one of the best I have seen in my years of zoo visiting and their breeding record is outstanding, the "small" lake (in the gallery) you say they have to swim in is quite large and the biggest I have ever seen in any zoo or animal park, The elephants are mostly kept on dirt, cant say I saw too much concrete anywhere?, I have seen all the off exhibit areas for this herd which are not only quite large yards but also on dirt, (as shown in my photos in the Gallery), I also know that this herd is allowed to roam for many hours on most days in the large forest which is outback of the exhibits which is a very large area indeed, this is in fact a very successful herd with many calfs to their credit.

 

I forgot to mention in my last post that the building of the Chinese and Madagascan exhibits at Toronto are just in the planning phases and they still have to acquire the funding from various sources and also get confirmation on the various animal acquistions in order to complete them (the City of Toronto is having major issues in regards to their budget). That being said they hope to have these at least underway in the next 5 years or so. The elephants at African Lion Safari do have excellent areas behind the scenes but their new enclosure which they opened several years ago is mostly concrete and metal with some kind of substrate on the floor. They also do elephant shows, which take place in a amphitheatre of sorts where they show the baby elephants playing with large balls and the keepers making the elephants do "tricks" etc.

 

I'm not totally sure of the current numbers but the last time I was there (last summer some time) they only had one bull on premises. They do own several that are on loan to various locations in the states. They also had I beleive something like 7 females and had several calves there too. Did you ever make it out to the Bowmanville Zoo, just the other side of Toronto? They have both Asian and African Elephants and until a few years ago had Angus who was supposedly the largest elephant in captivity. Sadly he died from an infection a week before they were going to be sending him back to South Africa.

 

Just found on the net that the International elephant foundtion says the ALS @ Rockton have 15 now which they say is the larest herd in North America.

No I did not know about the Bowmanville zoo maybe next time I get over there I look it up, sad to hear about Angus do you have any pics of him?. I got to see the herd of African elephants at Toronto zoo close up, a shame that the male died some years ago as they were breeding them, I think the herd started out with one male and 8 females. Why were they sending Angus back to Africa?.

 

Hi Mark, I'll try and look out some photos of Angus and scan them in. They were sending him back to Africa due to the fact that he was becoming very difficult to work with when he was in musth and also due to the fact that when they had previously been in Africa filming a movie Angus had actually interacted with several wild elephants so they thought that he was a good candidate for reintroduction into one of the national parks. Quite a few of the animals at Bowmanville are trained for use in the entertainment industry and Angus was one of the owner's best animals so after the years of service that Angus had given him, Michael felt it only fitting to do something for Angus.

 

That would be great, I thought he may of be of better valve in breeding terms in North America? than sending back to Africa, its not uncommon for bull elephants to be " difficult" when in musth, thats just a fact for any zoo keeping males. Do you have any idea of Angus size and weight?