Edinburgh Zoo Notes on a visit 6/8/12

I've seen photos of Edinburgh's male Banteng and he looks a great specimen. Do you/anybody know where the female came from?

 

Are they even the same ones that left, or a different lot perhaps?

 

The saga continues!

 

The female banteng has come from Munich and the Visayan warty pigs have come from Rotterdam.
A male crowned lemur has also arrived.
A nyala was also born last week.
2.0 Lesser kudu have been born and 0.0.1 Azara's agouti born
In the Australian aviary a Victoria crowned pigeon chick hatched.

 

Had a really lovely afternoon at the zoo yesterday, especially as it got dark. It was so quiet and the animals all seemed really relaxed and were great to watch. I took my time so didn't get to see anywhere near the whole zoo but it was just a really nice time, especially as I hadn't been for a while. The hippos were particularly entertaining with little Eve and her mum play fighting in the indoor pool. Saw one of the cassowaries showing just how much he dislikes the keepers-wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of him!

There's been lots of movements of animals to different enclosures since I was last there (its been a while), most of which I think have been reported. Couple of things I noticed that I'm not sure have been mentioned: Victoria crowned pigeon chick has fledged and is showing nicely in Australian aviary now. Nesting is still ongoing in brilliant birds with a nicobar and a green wing dove on nests currently, while the oscillated turkey has really made her presence known-very happy to walk amongst the visitors. There were young agoutis out and about (looked quite small still). The banteng are integrated-saw them last thing lying next to each other in their house looking very happy together. Heck cattle have all left the park, leaving the paddocks at the top of the hill and their more recent enclosure where the banteng was previously empty. These, along with the ex-maned wolf enclosure, mean there's a lot of empty space up the hill at the moment. The anteaters had access to an off-show indoor area (connected to the main indoor viewing) that I've not noticed open before-perhaps there's something happening with them? The red river hog groups is 2 adults and 2 youngsters as far as I could tell. And finally, marbled polecats seem to have all left the zoo without my having noticed.

 

Anyone know if these are the same RR Hogs they had previously, or new ones from somewhere else?

 

I'll miss them. Only got really good views once but seeing them at all was always a welcome bonus. Feel same about the sousliks too, will miss trying to spot them come spring. Both are species I've never seen elsewhere too.

 

Now that I think about it, I didn't see the Polecats. There house was empty, and seemed smal. The viewing window was painted over. Where did they go, and are they planning to replace them with something?

 

I would class this as an off topic question, but, does anybody know what was previously in the space currently occupied by the chimps in the budongo trail.

 

the top part of the outdoor enclosure was the chimps old outdoor enclosure and their old house was just below that (roughly in the middle of the current enclosure) then behind the chimps was the parrot garden, then the reptile house which was alongside the old bird house that had small outdoor aviaries facing the car park.