I've seen pictures of two different enclosures and more saying the enclosure is being renovated to house a different species. Does anyone know more about this? Do they still have polar bears and if not, what happened to them?
Artis has 2 bear enclosures, both very small and without any vegetation, just concrete pits. One was used for sloth bears a few years ago and one for polar bears. Then (around 2004) the last sloth bear was sent to another zoo (Beekse Bergen) and the last polar bear, female Tanya, got both enclosures. Which was still a bad situation. A few weeks ago Artis has finally sent Tanya away (to Rotterdam Zoo where a totally new polar bear enclosure has just been opened!). The 2 bear enclosures in Artis will get a renovation and will probably used for one (male surplus) spectacled bear. I`m not sure if that is such a good idea because although spectacled bears are smaller, the old bear enclosures in Artis are not suitable for ANY bear species, so I`d better see some small mammals (coatis, or lemurs for example) in there. The plan is to build a new polar bear enclosure in a few years. I personally hope these plans will change because I don`t think that Artis has enough space for that.
A small correction; the time that Tania was the only bear in artis, she lived in the old slothbear-enclosure. That wasn't connected to the "polarbear-pit". The pit was used for surpluss sealions for a while. The slothbear-enclosure wasn't a great place to keep a bear but it was ok. They added lots of earth, dirt, woodships etc. (i think artis has plenty of space for a new bear-enclosure, because that will be on both current bear-enclosures including the axisdeer/nilgai enclosure. Those combined is a very nice big area.) As of yesterday visitors can see Tania in Blijdorp. I was there today and i will post some pics shortly in the blijdorpthread.
Trebrauna, do you know what is strange underground water-filled hole in bear exhibit? I am really worried if Artis can build good polar bear enclosure. Nearby sealion pool is very, very, very bad architecture. Huge structure, but actual space for sealions is tiny and shallow. Underwater viewing windows are also tiny, despite being in huge gallery. Lots of passages and stairs which don't give a view of animals or anything else. And whole thing clashes architecturaly with the nearby old buildings. Artis zoo should fire its architect and take one from Blijdorp! Or West Berlin - they can manage limited space!
I´m not quite sure i understand what you say. You mean it´s weird that they have that small pool downstairs at the back? That was weird yes. That was probably because the enclosure used to be for sloth bears and didn't have a pool. They only area in the enclosure large enough to make a pool was there... Luckily that is no problem anymore now. Why wouldn't artis be able to make a decent new exhibit? You don't have to worry about the present bear-pits not being good enough for a future enclosure, because those will be destroyed (they're not monuments). So the possible new polarbear exhibit will be build from scratch. (but first they will have to find enough funds)
When I visited Artis last week the old polar bear pit was being used for nutrias, while their exhibit is being renovated. A sign by the larger of the old bear exhibits (the one Tania just left) said that this exhitbit will be renovated to hold spectackled bears and coatis. Even though it is clearly NOT suitable for any larger bear species.
The new polarbears exhibit will be extend with the present exhibit of the Malyan tapirs and axis deers. As you can see on the drawings below (Masterplan Artis, 2007).
