Yep, you are correct - I'm not sure which exhibit I was thinking of, but I got my wires crossed somewhere. The outdoor exhibit is not particularly large - although not bad per se, it's definitely the smallest of the macropod exhibits in that area. A few more exhibit photos: Australian Water Rat I don't have any good photographs of this exhibit with the current inhabitants, but it is more or less the same as it was when I took the following photograph in 2017, at which time it contained Eastern Quoll - so it should provide a good impression of the exhibit overall. Dingo Australian Wetland Aviary This aviary (located close to the Japanese Garden, uphill from the Philippine House) contains the following species; Sarus Crane, Black Swan, Straw-necked Ibis, Glossy Ibis, White-faced Heron, Magpie Goose, Plumed Whistling Duck, Maned Duck, Pacific Black Duck and Hardhead. Along with these, there are of course many aviaries dotted around the collection - several of which contain species relevant for the purview of this challenge. Although it has been noted in the past that the aviaries throughout the collection have become a little crowded since the bulk transfer of a large portion of the former offshow bird collection into the onshow aviaries, this issue has rather reduced in the last year or so due to a combination of animals being transferred out of the collection or dying, the expansion of some existing aviaries, and the construction of at least a few new ones. As such, these aviaries are now rather higher quality in my opinion than had previously been the case..... and of course, the selection of species within are nothing to be sniffed at. Australian Aviary Complex These aviaries are located near the main Australasian area, and contain the following species; note that some of these photographs are from periods when the species list was not the same: Common Bronzewing, Eastern Rosella, Superb Parrot, Bush Thick-knee, Wonga Pigeon, Masked Lapwing, Australian Ringneck, Bar-shouldered Dove and Red-winged Parrot. ---- Green Rosella, Chestnut Teal, Australian Shoveler and New Zealand Scaup ---- Long-nosed Potoroo, White-necked Magpie, Blue-faced Honeyeater Australian Aviaries in Dinopark Tawny Frogmouth, Western Rosella and Mulga Parrot ---- Bush Thick-knee, Masked Lapwing, Brush Bronzewing, Diamond Dove, Peaceful Dove, Bourke's Parrot, Scarlet-chested Parrot, Hooded Parrot and Red-winged Parrot ---- Swift Parrot, Wild Budgerigar, Plum-headed Finch, Blue-faced Parrotfinch, Red-browed Finch, Painted Finch, Diamond Firetail and Black-throated Finch Moluccan and Lesser Sundaic Aviary close to Rhino House Beautiful Fruit Dove, Barred Dove, Timor Zebra Finch, Dusky Munia, Scaly-breasted Munia, Great-billed Mannakin, Black-faced Munia and White-headed Munia New Caledonian Aviary Kagu and Horned Parakeet --- Some further general shots of aviaries within these areas of the zoo to give an idea of design/size/etc; I think these two both contain Sulawesi species currently, so given the redefinition of the category has cut this island out from consideration I won't bother listing species.
Never mind you've still reminded me of several marsupial species I'd omitted to mention, and hence helped to clarify the scope of the collection.
I think @Hongabonga is a fan of Plzen's Madagascan collection given his/her posts in some other threads like this:
I like the look of these exhibits a lot, particularly the aviaries. Nothing too flashy, but decently sized and thickly vegetated. These photos solidify my 2-1 vote for Plzen.
The poll closed just as I was about to vote for Cologne (not that it would have changed much as Plzen had one more 3-0 vote in its favor but yeah)!
Would have certainly liked to hear @Hongabonga's explanation of his vote. I dunno if this is relevant but he has only posted twice and one of those posts was praising Plzen's Madagascan collection as the best on a different thread.
I think in the great scheme of things his vote didn't make much of a difference, compared to the relative lack of any information posted about Köln - I am honestly quite surprised that Plzen somehow scraped the win! However, if you are concerned about that vote in particular I can vouch for him - he is one of the German zoo enthusiasts who kindly met up with me during my 2014 trip to Berlin, and is one of several founders of ZTL.
While I eventually did side with Plzen, I do agree that an explanation his vote would have been nice, especially since he was online during the repeated requests for one afaik.. ~Thylo
Oh, agreed - I was just forestalling the possible implication from the remark about low post count that he wasn't a genuine voter.
I read that post and it gave me more, not less confidence in the integrity of the vote. Saying that Plzen had the best Madagascan collection is almost literally the only thing he has said on the site, so it's clearly a sincere opinion that is relevant to the category.
