Los Angeles Zoo & Botanical Gardens Sumatran rhino move.

"Welcome Feddi"

 

Yep Welcome Freddi, some input from London would be interesting,

 

Thanks allot for this very interesting discussions .

Plesed to know there are some people out there passionate about the Sumatran Rhinoceros.

Thought about adding my Icelandic voice...

But having a massive problems posting my messsage so will probably give up...

Best Wishes from London

 

Bless it´s working...

(Sorry about my spelling!)

I am very pleased Andalas is going back to Sumatra. I think it´s the only viable option in this breeding program at present time. It´s great he will get a change saving his species. He is still young though, only six in September.

I am very concerned about the risks involved.
I guess he will have some immunity from his mother against diseases he will possible face in his new home. Having been born and brought up in foreign Zoo´s will make him very vulnerable.

There have been so many sad stories from this breeding program over the years, but some good ones recently. We really need some good ones...

Trying to be optimistic as he is such a precious animal and I am sure he will be looked well after.

This interest is a bit off an Asperger one... but I am very curious to know if over the years there has been storaged some viable sperm from the many males that have been in this breeding program over the years?
I know Cincinnaty zoo has managed this with it´s only breeding male.
Althought the Sumatran rhinoceros is an induced ovulator and an AI will be very difficult, the staff at the Cincinnaty Zoo have done some really brilliant things over the years!

I think that the option of breeding the young female in Cinncinaty when she becomes mature with one of her first relatives should be a possibility. But I guess it would be very difficult for the Zoo to give such information out to the public...

Well thanks allot

Keeping my finger crossed..

BW Feddi

 

freddi - i too would be interested if genetic material, be it sperm or whatever has been preserved of all the non-breeing animals that have died in, or still are in captivity. even more so i am interested to know whether there are any other obscure zoos i indonesia or malaysia that house this species.

i guess at the heart of the question as to whats best in this delicate scenario is this "why did cincinatti zoo succeed?"

i put it to you guys that it was a lot of good research (that i'm sure you'll all agree with me on) but also a good dose of luck.

luck that not only did they have a pair that defied the odds and actually SURVIVED captivity in a zoo but also that they had a pair that actually liked eachother!

for me - the situation is too delicate to be messing around with the problems associated with having the tiny captive population split on either side of the world. what i'm hoping is that the fact that precious andalas has moved to indonesia means that their will be a much greater focus on getting that cincinatti success and expertise into the centre there.

my advice would be to continue to test the waters with andalas. but be prepared to move suci there should andalas do well. there is no point moving emi and ipuh. they should continue to stay at the zoo in the US and pump out as many babies as they can.

there may not be any males for suci to breed with in indonesia at this stage, but there is a chance that will change. that chance does not exist in cincinatti.

in any case moving andalas we must all agree, is a vey positive move and i wish them the best chance of success.

 

Cincinatti Zoo

I have heard that Cincinatti Zoo has been known as the sexiest zoo due to a good record for breeding of numerous animal species ....
Whether it is because of astute zookeeping , food/diet , or whatever .....
I sometimes wonder why a zoo like Wellington does an excellent job on breeding primates when its infrastructure is almost falling apart , and why Zoo Oregon and Springfield MO zoos have successes in breeding elephants ( as much as zoos are concerned )

Sumatran rhinos should do OK in KL Zoo Negara , Melaka Zoo or Taiping Zoo
assuming that they have the room . These would be the only zoos that will take on a serious attempt at breeding them . There is alsoi the Endau Rompin sanctuary that I have referred to before . Most other zoos in the country are a disgrace and needs to close .
I am not aware of any zoo or rhino sanctuary in Sumatra itself .

 

nigel, the way kambas sumatran rhino breeding center we have been talking about, the one that andalas is being moved to, is on the island of sumatra.

from what i have read sumatran rhino have been kept at zoo melaka before, including a animal captured pregnant in the 80's that gave birth at the zoo. like the animals at sungai dusin - they have all prematurely died there.

taiping zoo got busted for purchasing gorillas they knew to be poached from the wild. hardly a zoo for conservation as far as i am concerned.

putting rhino in any zoo right now seems a little rediculous to me. in the long run should a good founder base be sourced and the captive population thrives at the centre and grows dramatically, we can expect to see sumatran rhino begin to pop up in zoos again. and those animals should go to the zoos that can best provide for them and that have financed the conservation effort at way kambas (though belonging to the indonesian government probably wont).

 

I'm pretty sure the reason Concinnati succeeded with breeding Sumatran rhino was mainly due one factor- the YOUNG age of the female Emi. She was only about a year old on capture, unlike most of the others. So when Cincinnati obtained her from Los Angeles she was still in her prime. Time was on their side, even for the several pregnancies which resulted in miscariages. Cincinnati's own female Rapunzel was an older animal-they could do nothing with her as she was past breeding and she was later sent to Bronx New York Zoo as an exhibit only. She died about a year ago.

I'm not detracting from the expertise they have developed but if Emi had been a middle aged, or even older female, they could well have failed as did the other zoos in America and Port Lympne in UK- who all got older females. Port Lympne had two consecutive females(both died) which were probably too old to breed with their male Torgamba, he outlived both and was returned to Way Kambas, Sumatra. Sadly he hasn't bred there either.

 

i'm hoping that the way kambas facility has been collecting sperm samples from him as often as possible. even if they can get just one successful birth from him it will be a major boost.

 

I was told by the head keeper of the Sumartan rhinos at Port Lympne in 87 that the first female that arrived there had a bad leg injury that was from a poachers snare from some time before she was caught and was sent there away, I seem to remember being told she was an old animal, the female I saw was the second one to arrive. The plan was for them to get two pairs.

Love these guys. They had everything for their comfort, the rhino house was heated in cold weather and even the indoor mud pools was heated. They had a cold store room inside the house with heaps of tropical friut flown in for them 2 to 3 times a week, there must of been a truck load of friut in there.

 

Patrick- yes, if they have collected semen from Torgamba it may prove useful somewhere down the line- its a great shame they haven't been able to breed from him. Unlike Port Lympne's two females, he was a much younger animal but it seems both at Port Lympne and later at Way Kambas he has had older/non fertile(?) partners. Now they have young females at Way Kambas,it seems too late for him as he isn't in 100% good health anymore. Its all enormously frustrating. Perhaps with Andalas, Rosa & Ratu things will finally come together as these three are all perfectly aged for success....

Mark- no, it wasn't Port Lympne's fault really they failed with the Sumatrans. They certainly feed their animals(all species) a better diet than just about any other zoo- no expense was spared with their care either. The 2nd female was called Meranti- after she died I think the post mortem showed the usual tumours in her uterus etc indicating yet another elderly female. The irony is that Torgamba was a relatively young male in those days.

It seems many of the females which were captured and then randomly dstributed among the zoos during the 1980's turned out to be elderly so those zoos were doomed to fail right from the start. I think seven went to the U.S. but by chance only Los Angeles got a young female- Emi, and an older male which died, so Emi was then 'loaned' to Cincinnati who had the only remaining male- Ipuh (plus Rapunzel, another elderly female). You know the rest....

 

I was not blaming port lypmne for anythng??, I know how well they were taken care off, i did get to see them off exhibit and a tour of there rhino house, they were very well looked after, It was bad luck that they did not breed them

 

didnt u say they had an indoor heated mud bath mark?

 

Yes they did, they had a heated mud bath in each pen, I was amazed at the setup.

 

Mark- I was just agreeing that they were very well cared for but I didn't know they had heated indoor mudpools though as I never went in the inside areas. That's pretty amazing and I don't think Cincinnati's have anything like that indoors. Have you seen the Cincinnati 'rhinocam' ?

I saw the Sumatran rhinos at Port Lympne about four times, the last time was just Torgamba on his own not long before he went back to Sumatra.

 

When I saw them there I was very lucky to be taken to the off exhibit areas which included the rhino house, and even better for me as they let me pat them and give a good rub around there heads and behind their ears which of coarse they loved, I was as close as you could get and they seemed to really like the contact.

Besides the mud pool they also had a heated water pool just in case they wanted a soak for a while. I do remember they had around 8 night pens in the rhino house.

 

I got to feed and touch Torgamba too, but in the outside area...

I reckon Andalas will have reached Way Kambas, Sumatra by now- he flew to Jakarta on Feb.18th and then several hours overland journey to the sanctuary so he should be settling in by now.

Cincinnati say they plan to extend their Sumatran rhino accomodation, both to allow year-round public viewing and also to take more animals and extend the genepool -so it sounds as if they hope to keep the young female Suci (Andalas' sister) and maybe get another male from Sumatra? I guess what happens in future with the Cincinnati animals depends on agreement with Indonesia, who still own all the rhinos.

 

here's an email I received as a reply when I asked them about the popssibility of getting more sum rhinos



Dear Jason -
Thank you for appreciating our rhinos. Believe me, it is a privilege to
work with these amazing animals.

Emi's pregnancy is progressing very well. Before you know it, we will
have another calf to enjoy!

As a part of our current capital campaign, we are planning to build a
new Sumatran rhino enclosure that will ensure year-round viewing for the
public and access to mud for the animals. It will be an expansion on
the space we already have in the hopes that the program will continue to
grow. There was some discussion about importing an older female at the
end of this year, but it does not look like that will happen. The new
exhibit is still several years away but still a very exciting expansion
of our critically important program.

Thanks for your interest!

Regards,
Terri

 

Thanks allot for allowing us to see the response from Cincinnati.

I have massive respect for their hard work and the fact they cracked the code. Obviously they had some luck, ie the female was very young.
But third calf in under 6 years is also brilliant.

I have never seen a sumatran rhino life, but I check on them regularly on the rhino cam.

I had a biology teacher back in Kópavogur, Iceland who saw the famale the Copenhagen zoo had for some years. He showed us a slide show highlighting the plight of the rainforest and its animals.

Well I got seriously infected back then and now cherish this slightly "Asperger" part of my personality...

Thanks allot

Best Wishes

 

I have a nice pic of that female Sumatran rhino that was kept in the Copenhagen zoo that was sent to me (in 1973) by the Director of the the day "Arnie", The female was called Subur (the fertile one) and arrived at Copenhagen on the 5th December 1959, it was a collaboration between them and Basel zoo, the plan was a number were to be transfered to a small number of Europen zoos for breeding. I do have the details stored away somewhere.