Theoretical walkthroughs

Small carnivores? So far, meerkat in Longleat, yellow mongoose in Magdeburg, red fox and wildcat in Goldau (separately. Visitors can go into viewing shelters, which open to the exhibits, animals could easily jump in and out but the shelters are bare and uninteresting).

I think more species could be exhibited this way. The problem would be giving a large exhibit, and picking animals which are not tame and would not approach people.

Something like bat-eared fox, kinkajou or zebra mongoose I can easily imagine. Possibly also ones like arctic fox or any small cat in this viewing shelter arrangement.

 

I highly doubt kinkajous would work this way. They are too curious of an animal and I'd expect this walkthrough to go poorly. Bat-eared or Arctic Foxes, while I wouldn't encourage trying them, are more likely to work than the kinkajou. I don't know anything about the mongooses so can't help you there.

 

I personally believe that zoos should play it safe with walkthroughs. Don't try new things that have a high risk of failure. I'm all fine with tropical birds, waterfowl, tortoises, butterflies, lemurs, kangaroos, wallabies, fruit bats, sloths, domestics, and penguins- but beyond that I wouldn't want to risk trying something that could end in visitor or animal injury. I also believe that with the exception if some walkthrough aviaries, no walkthrough exhibit should be unsupervised, and that it should be a requirement that a staff or volunteer is present.

 

I think all of the mammals @Jurek7 mentions would potentially bite or scratch visitors given the right circumstances or stressors and a zoo using this setup would end up with a lawsuit.

 

I've actually been in a walk-through Kinkajou exhibit at the now closed World Aquarium.

 

I'm fairly certain I've heard of a walkthrough with Kinkajou before, though I'm not sure where

 

Small and mid-sized ungulates?

There used to be muntjac in a small exhibit in Eindhoven. Alpine Ibex at Innsbruck. Both species had a visitor path along one perimeter, and I feel the success was based on that animals were not attracted there.

Then come large exhibit, acre or more. Parc Animalier Des Pyrénées keeps Roe deer, Pyrenean chamois, Alpine ibex, European mouflon, Barbary shep and Cretan goat on 7 hectares (17 acres) exhibit crisscrossed with several paths. Goldau has free-ranging sika and mouflon. There are more safari parks with walkthroughs. Lelystad has several wooded exhibits several hectares in size, with species up to European Bison. And at this size, we are coming to traditional deer parks in Europe used to keep red deer and fallow deer for centuries.

I think most deer, antelope and goats/sheep could be kept in walkthrough, if the exhibit was very large (in the order of one acre or more), the path was located along the edge, with plenty of space for ungulates to keep away from people, and the particular individual animals were not tame or especially agressive.

 

I do think it depends on the species. There's probably plenty of species that would be too aggressive for this.

Also Kobe animal kingdom (Japan) with Sitatunga and Hellabrun (Germany) with Chevrotain (technically not walkthrough, but free-roaming in their rainforest hall)

 

Seeing that Amersfoort used to have a Brush-tailed porcupine walkthrough in the nocturnal house, would a walkthrough enclosure work with any other porcupines? Either new world (North American porcupine or Coundou) or old world (Crested or Cape)?

 

I think it would depend on the individual animal. The Crested Porcupine at Brookfield tends to be somewhat skittish. At least the one on exhibit. To be fair, they had it displayed with two Bat-Eared Foxes that day and they were chasing it around and it was brandishing it's quilled backside everywhere. I know that Crested and other porcupines are often ambassador animals, though. I think it would be a situation where there would have to be a keeper or docent available to make sure no one did anything silly.

 

Skanders Regskov has a snake walk-through indeed.

Nordhorn has this exact setup as well, whilst Planckendael has a walk-through exhibit which at one point contained 3 species of owl (great grey, barn and long-eared). Other places with an owl-walk through I know about are Köln ( barn and long-eared owls) and Vleteren (European and Siberian great horned owl).

 

Which should of-course be Randers regnskov, not Skanders regskov

 

Owl walkthroughs are also at Walsrode, Goldau, Berlin Zoo and Avifauna in the Netherlands. I guess there are many more in smaller European zoos and wildlife parks.

At Walsrode there is a largish area covering several trees. A sign tells visitors how many owls are inside - I could only find about half of them! There is also a visitor shelter, and one Barn Owl squeezed itself in a very small hollow space under the roof.

Breeding owls are often aggressive towards people, so these walkthroughs either keep non-breeders / non-releasable rescues or are temporarily closed during the breeding season.

 

I think some interestin subjects of this topic can be found in Planet Zoo: the animals that in the game can have guests walking among them are Aardvark, Aldabra Giant Tortoise, Chinese Pangolin, Columbian White-Faced Capuchin Monkey, Galapagos Giant Tortoise, Giant Anteater, Greater Flamingo, Indian Peafowl, Japanese Macaque, King Penguin, Koala, Llama, Okapi, Pronghorn Antelope, Red Ruffed Lemur, Ring-Tailed Lemur, Springbok and Thomson's Gazelle. While I found most of them normal to see in walk-through habitat, I find some really weird for example the antelopes, let's say that they do not stab the visitors to death, won't they be really stressed? Same with the okapi; also let's take a look at the toothless animals, while they won't try to eat you, they have terribly long and strong claws, which can be a threat to visitors if the animal is in a bad mood

 

Japanese macaque walkthrough already exists in Olomouc, Czechia. It is a huge, very lush exhibit.

Aardvarks weigh ca 70kg and could easily push or trip a human, especially a child. There is the problem with aardvarks - in nocturnal exhibits, they are very active but limited space would force them to often run into visitor path. In a day exhibit, they are a bit pointless to display, because they sleep, preferably hidden underground.

 

I suppose it would be easy to do a walkthrough with Capybara. Don't know if this has been done yet, but they are usually fairly docile.

It's not really a walkthrough, but Brookfield Zoo used to have free-roaming golden lion tamarins in a forested section of the park. They shared the same space as the public. I'm not sure if they do this any longer, but last time I was there the signs were still up.

They also climb overhead along with a sloth, Goeldi's Monkeys and Titi Monkeys in Brookfield's Tropic World. That's not really the same, as the space is done so that they cannot really get down to where the people are unless they REALLY wanted to.

 

In general, males are also less aggressive then females I heard.

However, I do know at least two aviaries where I they kept a breeding couple. In Rheine, they breed with their snow and great grey owls (though they might close off the aviary during breeding season I suspect) and in Planckendael the breeding pair of barn owls are kept in the walkthrough aviary.

 

Many zoos have tamarins in walkthrough exhibits. Inside I recall Artis and Duisburg, whilst outside there are just too many to count.

Titi and saki’s are also kept inside in Artis (saki) and Duisburg (Titi).

In Pairi Daiza and GaiaZoo they even have howlers in their outdoor walkthroughs .

 

there are nutible walk trough capybara exhibits in japan, I would even say, capybara petting zoos

 

Do we know of any wombat walkthroughs? I could find one picture of one in Auckland zoo, but that's all I could find

Wallaby Walkabout - ZooChat