The Bavarian Adventures Of A Tea-Loving Dave - April 2015

Either way, I hope it provokes more comments than my Munich posts have been! Although computer issues have slowed my pace somewhat, it would be nice to know people *are* reading when I do get reports posted!

I have managed to get my Tierpark Hellabrunn shots up now and edited my previous post, by the by.

 

Well, they can't all be Berlin I certainly wouldn't call Munich a damp squib - if it were in the United Kingdom, and compared to similar collections, it would probably only be beaten outright by Chester, and would give stiff competition to collections such as Bristol, London, Cotswold Wildlife Park and so forth. Each of those collections would beat Hellabrunn in some areas, but would be beaten *by* Hellabrunn in others.

Bit of a vicious cycle computer issues slow me down anyhow - my desktop computer has broken down and I dislike using laptops to write long-form prose, so can only really get a good head of steam when visiting Helly and using her desktop - which means people reply less, which means it's harder for me to motivate myself to sit down and get writing

In any case, I'm doing better than Hix is with his trip report

 

As I have a shade under two months before my next trip, I'm aiming to get the majority of this report finished before I set off, so that I can start the next report significantly quicker if I keep up a rate of two or three posts a week I *should* manage this.

 

Hehe, I thought I was quite critical of some of the more run-down areas of Tierpark Hellabrunn I was certainly critical of the fact that the current director of Tierpark Berlin and Zoo Berlin seems desperate to change vast areas of said collections considering the fact that he seemingly thought enclosures no better - and sometimes worse - were perfectly acceptable when he was at Hellabrunn!

Your suspicions are correct in a similar fashion to my Magdeburg review, I plan on devoting a thread to my Alpenzoo write-up so that I can upload shorter posts and therefore provide more photographic attachments in total - the limit per post being six images. This is partially because it is a collection far fewer Zoochatters have visited, and partially because at the present time literally *nothing* has been posted about the collection on the site, barring comments in unrelated threads and a smattering of decade-old photographs.

After I have finished that thread, I will (again like I did for Zoo Magdeburg) cross-post the text of my review into the main trip thread, with links to the original posts so that people can see the full array of image attachments.

Restricting myself purely to collections I have actually visited myself:

Chester Zoo - although the two Berlin collections have taken the top spot as my favourite zoos, Chester is still hands-down the best the UK can offer, and is improving all the time.

ZSL London - fallen a little from its glory days, in my opinion, but essential if one is seriously interested in zoological history. It still has one of the greatest aquariums and insect collections in Europe, however.

Zoo Berlin / Tierpark Berlin - as I have noted in the past, I cannot really untangle the two of these collections; the strengths of each complement the other, often filling in areas where the other falls short. Moreover, Zoo Berlin is (like ZSL London) an essential collection for reasons of zoo history, and contains some gorgeous zoological architecture, whilst Tierpark Berlin is possibly the "Walsrode" of hoofstock.

Zoo Leipzig - despite my known reservations about the feel and direction of the collection, Leipzig is definitely a "must-visit" for anyone serious about zoological collections for one reason: no matter what one thinks about the contents of Gondwanaland, it is a fantastic piece of architecture and engineering.

Collections I have not visited, but would likely also include in this category, include Prague, Vienna, Antwerp, Bronx and San Diego.

 

In a few short months I will have visited Walsrode and Tierpark Hagenbeck, so will be able to include those collections on my list from personal experience

 

April 10th 2015: Wilhelma

Part I: Greenhouses and Gardens

The next morning, we rose particularly early as we had pre-booked train tickets for a service which was to depart München Hbf at 0630; having packed the previous night we were able to leave the hotel promptly after getting dressed and ensuring we had our train tickets, making our way to U-Marienplatz and taking the U-Bahn to the Hauptbahnhof. Here, having a little time before boarding our time we picked up an assortment of sweet and savoury pastries from some of the bakery stands within the station, with a view to eating these for breakfast and possibly saving a few items to snack on as we walked around Wilhelma. Boarding the train at platform 14, we noted that the coaches of this particular service (ICE 692) were subtly different from any of those we had encountered during our trip to Berlin the previous year; this particular service was a cross-country train which was to terminate in Berlin, so we knew we would have to be particularly careful not to fall asleep and miss our stop!

The journey was a pleasant and uneventful one, passing through attractive countryside and the fringes of the Black Forest, and also giving me my first ever sight of the famous River Danube. After a little over two hours, we arrived at Stuttgart Hbf at 0847; the station was in a state of flux at the time of our visit, with massive areas of ongoing construction and whole sections inaccessible to the public. This is due to an ongoing project - Stuttgart 21 - which aims to convert the terminus portions of the station into an underground through-station, demolishing the vast majority of the current surface structures in the process. As a result, we had to walk through an overpass which bypassed much of the construction work in order to reach the U-Bahn station. Here, we came across a slight stumbling block - in those German cities and towns we had encountered thus far, the ticket machines had touchscreens and multi-lingual explanations of the various ticket options; conversely in Stuttgart, only the names of the various options were given, without any means of getting further explanation of the options. As a result, my faltering grasp of Deutsch made it somewhat difficult for us to work out which ticket we would need; eventually, however, we managed to work out which option we needed and made our way to the correct platform for the U14 line. This line would take us to the U-Wilhelma stop, only a hundred yards or so from the collection itself - a journey of about eight minutes or so.



On arrival, we could see the entrance building quite clearly. Here, it strikes me as appropriate to give a little of the background to Wilhelma itself. The collection is just as much a botanical garden as it is a zoological collection, being home to around 6,000 species of plants and 11,500 animals from all over the world, located in a complex of greenhouses, ornamental gardens, parkland and ornate buildings. In point of fact, Wilhelma has been a botanical garden far longer than it has ever been a zoological collection, having originated as a private garden and royal residence for Wilhelm I of Württemberg; during the early 1840s Moorish architecture had come into fashion amongst the royal families of Europe, and as such Wilhelm I ordered that the structures within his new residence should be constructed in this style. On September 30th 1846, the royal residence and gardens – named Wilhelma for the king himself – was formally opened, and used for the private pleasure of the royal family over the decades that followed, the addition of a Moorish banqueting hall and other secondary structures in the years that followed meant that in time, Wilhelma was also used as a venue for functions held by Wilhelm and other members of the German aristocracy. However, by the 1880’s, with Wilhelm I now deceased and his son Karl Friedrich now on the throne, the gardens were opened up to the general public with the purchase of a ticket. This continued into the twentieth century, with the end of the German monarchy in 1918 leading to Wilhelma becoming a state-owned botanical garden, which flourished up until the Second World War. As with many such collections and notable sites throughout Germany, Wilhelma suffered badly during the war, with many areas of the site left damaged or even destroyed. By the end of the war, the only areas remaining intact were the "Moorish Garden", a number of the tropical greenhouses, the Belvedere Pavilion and the Damascene Hall – however, Wilhelma was re-opened to the public after the end of the war, with much of the damage having been repaired. In the 1950’s, temporary exhibitions of animals started to be put on display at Wilhelma; however, those animals that arrived seldom departed, remaining on-site. As such, the 1950s can be said to be the point from which the collection started to become a zoological garden, having long-since become famous in the field of botany.

As with many of the other structures and greenhouses at Wilhelma, the main gatehouse of the collection was designed and constructed by the architect Karl Ludwig von Zanth; I thought it looked very attractive, having a distinctive "feel" which definitely reflected the Moorish design elements which had been desired by Wilhelm I. After buying our entrance tickets, we made our way through the entrance barriers and headed straight to the zoo shop, in order to buy zooguides for ourselves and also some of our Zoochatter friends back in the United Kingdom. To our dismay, however, it appeared that the shop had entirely sold out of guidebooks; something which was doubly frustrating as the entry booths had contained plenty, but as we were buying multiple copies we had thought it best to wait until we entered the shop. However, this error was soon remedied; I made my way back to the entry barriers and requested permission to exit in order to purchase guidebooks from the ticket booths in the gatehouse - permission which was readily granted. This, incidentally, strikes me as an appropriate point to note that all the staff at Wilhelma with whom we had cause to interact throughout the day - both those who I was able to speak English to, and those with whom I had to converse in Deutsch - were extremely friendly and helpful, something which always makes one feel welcome to a collection. Along with the guidebooks, I also noticed a stack of free "zoo news" magazines next to the entrance to the first of the greenhouses which we were to enter - again, I picked up copies both for ourselves and for Zoochatters back in the United Kingdom. I had been able to print a copy of the Wilhelma map prior to our visit; as such I knew that it contained a suggested routeplan for how best to view the entire collection, including a numerical key labelling each major feature and structure. As we had arrived at the collection at almost 0930 - over an hour after it had opened - and would have to leave by around 1730 in order to be sure of reaching Stuttgart Hbf in time for our train, yet had been advised prior to our departure for Germany that Wilhelma was a collection which would likely require the full day to see effectively, we thought that following a suggested route would give us the best possible chance of missing as little as possible. As such, the first portion of the collection we would visit would be a row of greenhouses which led directly away from the main entrance.

The first of these greenhouses, the "Unteres Kakteenhaus", was incredibly hot and dry, and contained a vast array of cactuses and other succulent vegetation. Near the entrance to this greenhouse, a large noticeboard gave detailed information on the ecological conditions in Africa and Madagascar which gave rise to many of the species displayed within, along with descriptions of the main groups of succulent plants found within the arid areas of these locations. However, there were species of cactus and succulent on-display from locations all around the world, not merely Africa and Madagascar.



Some of these species were located in rockeries and plant-beds which ran along the public footpath within the greenhouse, whilst others - presumably those species which had more exacting requirements in order to flourish, or which were particularly delicate - were kept within glass display cases which would both allow for careful climate control, and also protect them from the public. The vast majority of species within this greenhouse were accompanied by labels, giving their common and scientific names; something which one does not often see in a zoological collection but which, of course, is commonplace in botanical gardens. The detail of information provided to visitors, and the fact that even now the botanical side of the collection seemed not to have been neglected in favour of the zoological, struck me as a promising sign indeed.

The second greenhouse we entered - labelled on the map as "Tropische Vogel" or "Tropical Birds" - was significantly smaller than the previous one, and far more lushly vegetated with an array of tropical plants; however there seemed only to be a single aviary within this greenhouse, containing Hartlaub's Turaco (Tauraco hartlaubi). As I am very fond of the turaco family as a whole, and this particular taxon is both one of the most attractive and one of those I have seen least often - having only viewed this species at ZSL London and Zoo Leipzig previously - I was nonetheless pleased to see this, the first captive animal species of the day. As the aviary containing the turaco was extremely thick with vegetation - such that very little other than the mesh of the cage differentiated it from the surrounding vegetation of the greenhouse - it is entirely possible that other species were contained within this aviary unlabelled, or indeed free-flying within the greenhouse itself, and that we merely failed to spot them during our time within.

The next greenhouse we entered - labelled as "Tropenhaus/Orchideen" on the map - was a similar size to the first, yet significantly more humid and lushly-vegetated, in this regard more akin to the second. As the name would suggest, this contained a wide range of tropical plants including passionflowers, bromeliads and pitcher-plants, along with display cases containing a vast number of orchid species; informational signage indicated that this was but a fraction of the orchid collection held at Wilhelma, and that the contents of the display cases were regularly swapped in and out as different species entered bloom in the off-display greenhouses elsewhere on-site. Both Helly and myself were very impressed with the sheer number and range of tropical plants visible within - although my tastes are strongly inclined towards the animal world, I have a distinct appreciation for well-designed and well-presented plant exhibits too! As with the cactus house, this particular house also contained copious labels and signposts giving taxonomic names for those plants on display within, as well as discussing the ecological importance of the orchid group in particular along with their requirements and in which habitats they can be found.

We then entered a massive greenhouse, the central point of the avenue of structures through which we had been walking, and which led from the main entrance through to the Moorish Garden; the map labelled this area as the "Wintergarten/Palmenhaus". The footpaths within this greenhouse followed the edges of the structure, with various species of plant located to either side of the path, whilst the centre of the greenhouse was taken up by a massive and lushly-vegetated lawn, dotted with flowerbeds and vast, mature palm trees and banana plants. Closer inspection of the lawn revealed, to my surprise and then pleasure, that what I had taken from afar to be a lawn of grass was in fact a thick blanket of clubmosses!



This central area was surrounded by bedding areas containing a wide range of tropical plants from around the world; possibly my favourite such area was a stretch which contained a vast array of citrus plants such as seville orange, grapefruit, lemon, mandarin and pomelo, to name but a few. Overall, I was extremely taken with this particular greenhouse; had we not been trying to keep to a schedule to ensure we saw as much of the collection as possible, I suspect we would have spent significantly more time within photographing the wide range of flowers, trees and plants within. To the right-hand side of the greenhouse, there was a blocked-off door; this was the first real disappointment of our visit, although thankfully an expected one - some months prior to our visit, the Small Mammal and Bird House which had been accessible through this door had closed to the public, with the intention of a comprehensive refurbishment taking place within prior to the house re-opening at the end of 2016. As noted, I had already been aware that this had taken place, but as the house had contained several species which would have comprised lifetick taxa for myself, it was nonetheless a disappointing development. However, as the information poster on the door detailed, although the vast majority of species which had been held within were either off-display or temporarily held at other collections, there were a handful of species which had been dispersed among other captive areas of Wilhelma. As such, one or two of the lifetick taxa which had been displayed within this area *would* still be seen by ourselves, with a little luck.

The next greenhouse we entered was akin in general design and humidity to the Orchid house we had already visited; however, the temperature was somewhat lower. This, the map told us, was the "Azaleenhaus" - as the name would suggest, the footpath led us between thick flower beds containing a wide range of azalea rhododendrons, which at the time of our visit were at the height of their flowering season. As such, we had perhaps picked the ideal time of year to view this particular portion of the botanical collection at Wilhelma, with the vast array of flowers looking extremely appealing to the eye. As one would expect, there was detailed and copious signage explaining the origin of these flowers in the cool mountainous climate of East Asia, and how as a result plants of this group have been found to thrive in the European climate. The signage also discussed the fact that, along with the camelias displayed elsewhere in the collection, the azalea belong to the oldest of Wilhelma's plant collections, having been kept at Wilhelma continuously since the birth of the collection.



The next greenhouse we reached was labelled on the map as "Tropische Kleinvogel" or "Small Tropical Birds"; like the the first such greenhouse we had reached, this greenhouse was small and lushly vegetated. However, unlike the "Tropical Bird" greenhouse, the bird exhibit within was rather less well-vegetated than the surrounding environs, allowing us to see the inhabitants rather more readily. Some of the taxa within were labelled, but others were left to us to identify either through recognising them from prior experience, or in one or two cases consulting our photographs at leisure at a later point. As far as we could tell, this aviary contained the following taxa:

Heck's Long-tailed Finch (Poephila acuticauda hecki)
Diamond Firetail (Stagonopleura guttata)
Chestnut-eared Finch (Taeniopygia guttata castanotis)
Diamond Dove (Geopelia cuneata)
Chinese Painted Quail (Synoicus chinensis)
Red-browed Firetail (Neochmia temporalis)
Double-barred Finch (Taeniopygia bichenovii)
Painted Firetail (Emblema pictum)
Plum-headed Finch (Neochmia modesta)
Red-faced Finch (Neochmia ruficauda)
Kittlitz's Plover (Charadrius pecuarius)

I was rather pleased with the range of taxa displayed within this exhibit; although some of the species were reasonably commonplace, others were quite unusual and a handful actually represented lifetick taxa for ourselves. Moreover, it was rather interesting to see such a wide range of waxbill species displayed together, allowing the range of variation present within the group to be seen. The aviary itself was reasonably good; a little empty of vegetation as already discussed but providing plenty of perching opportunities for the inhabitants through the use of branches and twigs, along with the provision of imitation rock areas, sandy areas and small pools on the floor of the exhibit.

The next greenhouse we reached - and the last in the row of houses leading to the Moorish Garden - was signposted on the map as the "Kamelienhaus"; as the name would suggest, this house therefore contained the camellia collection which I have already mentioned in the context of being one of the oldest parts of the botanical collection. In point of fact, informational signage and labels within this area indicated that some of the plants within this greenhouse are over 160 years old, and have been present for the entire history of Wilhelma. This house also contained the majority of the fuschia collection found within Wilhelma; however unlike the azaleas which we had viewed already, it was a little too early in the year for the fuschias to look at their most attractive and impressive, flowering as they do from May onward, whilst we had missed the optimum time to view the camellias - these tending to look their best in January and February. However, sufficient plants were either flowering early, or flowering late, for this greenhouse to nonetheless have its charms.

As we left the row of greenhouses, to our left we could see the off-show greenhouses and buildings where much of the behind-the-scenes horticulture essential to the botanical collection takes place; no doubt this will also be where much of the collection once displayed within the Small Mammal and Bird House is currently located. Continuing along, we were met with the covered walkways and pavilions of the Moorish Garden; attractive designs in the Moorish style decorated the walls of the covered walkways - designed to allow one to walk along the margins of the garden whilst remaining dry-shod in poor weather - whilst carefully shaped yew trees stood like sentinels on either side of the central avenue through the garden. The covered walkways also contained a wide range of attractive flower-beds, containing a wide variety of species. Throughout the Moorish Garden, however, possibly the most striking and beautiful feature was the presence of a vast number of magnolia trees, which at the time of our visit were coming into full bloom; close to the centre of the garden, a number of information boards discussed the magnolia tree, and informed us that there were around 70 trees in total within the Moorish Garden, allegedly the largest collection of magnolias in Europe north of the Alps, and that a number of these trees dated to the first days of Wilhelma, as did the yew trees I have already discussed. Needless to say, the information boards also discussed the origin and growing conditions of magnolias in general.



Along the central avenue of the garden, there were three shallow pools; the first and last of these concealed water fountains, which periodically activated. However, the second of these - located at the exact centre of the Moorish Garden - was significantly larger than the others, and contained a wide range of tropical water lilies, carefully selected and positioned to take into account the varying times of day when different water lily species will display their flowers, therefore ensuring a constant display of blooms throughout the day. Standing by the water lily display, it was possibly to look up the stone stairways and pavilions towards the Moorish Villa, the former living quarters of Wilhelm I of Württemberg; we would be visiting this structure later in the day, but it was nonetheless an appropriate time to view the structure from afar, admire its design and appearance, and note how well it "fit" the overall feel of the Moorish Garden over which it stood.



Around the central point of the Garden, there were four animal statues; one of a big cat fighting a snake, one of a lion, one - somewhat worn by the elements - which may have been intended to show either a wolf or a hyena, and one of a pair of deer. Although these no longer looked as good as they once did, as may be obvious by now I have a strong soft spot for interesting sculptures and artwork in zoological collections; this, alongside the very attractive flowers and trees found throughout the Moorish Garden, and the appealing-looking architecture of the surrounding walkways and pavilions, meant that I was very taken overall by this area of Wilhelma.

Leaving the Moorish Garden, we passed through an attractive ornate archway and made our way towards the first major animal exhibit of the day; the Rearing House.