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ZooChat Cup Match #28: Pairi Daiza vs Rome

Discussion in 'ZooChat Cup' started by CGSwans, 28 Mar 2018.

?

Large carnivores

Poll closed 1 Apr 2018.
  1. Pairi Daiza

    100.0%
  2. Rome

    0 vote(s)
    0.0%
  1. CGSwans

    CGSwans Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    A dangerous floater versus a zoo that's likely just along for the ride... but might cause an upset? The category: large carnivores.

    ZooChat Cup

    In summary, the rules of the game are as follows:
    - You may choose whatever criteria you like to decide how to vote, as long as it only relates to the category above.
    - You can use whatever resources you like to inform your vote, including Zoolex, Zootierliste, the ZooChat gallery, trip reviews, zoo maps, books and wherever else. You don't have to have visited both zoos to vote.
    - Votes are public and can be changed at any time before the poll closes.
    - The aim of the game is to provoke debate. Post explaining why you voted the way you did, and why others should join you.
    - Voting closes in four days
    - The one thing you can't do is vote based on anything other than the relevant category.

    Tomorrow, Duisburg vs Paris Vincennes.
     
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  2. lintworm

    lintworm Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    I changed the thread title for you, to include Rome.

    Pairi Daiza is very lucky to draw Rome on this one, though it still isn't guaranteed to win...
     
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  3. Dassie rat

    Dassie rat Well-Known Member 10+ year member

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    Both: Tiger (both have generic, Rome also has Sumatran)
    Pairi Daiza: Binturong; spotted hyena; South African cheetah; Indochinese clouded leopard; snow leopard; lion; African leopard; giant panda; Asiatic black bear; Asiatic small-clawed otter; giant otter; Cape fur seal; Nepalese red panda

    Rome: Northern lynx; Asiatic lion; North Persian leopard; maned wolf; Bosnian and Eurasian wolves; African wild dog; brown bear

    Pairi Daiza has a more varied collection and wins this one. Neither collection had any great oddities, apart from perhaps Pairi Daiza's Cape fur seal.

    Pairi Daiza has a far more interesting collection of marsupials.
     
  4. CGSwans

    CGSwans Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    Thanks.
     
  5. SabineB

    SabineB Well-Known Member

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    The match I was waiting for, because here is my Pairi Daiza-rant :cool:

    There are few zoos that annoy me more with their impertinence of building monuments, rather than top notch enclosures, than Pairi Daiza. That plus the omnipresent sound of bells and even more bells, real or as background-sounds..... Something that was interesting and new and certainly not overdone 5 -8 years ago has transformed into scenery driven atrocity. On top of that PD has taken in some animals, white tigers come to mind, way before their actual enclosures were finished only to keep them in virtual dungeons.

    It is maddening, because on principle the idea of Pairi Daiza is a good one, that, were it to be executed with any form of restraint (whether that be amount of animals on show or amount of decorational elements), could be so intriguing. To me it is basically Beauval on steroids without the the taste and expertise nor the cleverness of sweeping you off your feet without being so braggadocious.

    I have seen good, ok and not so good enclosures in Pairi Daiza, the lions and the spotted hyeanas stand out as particularly unfortunate to me, given the proximity to the visitor area and no real barrier I have repeatedly seen them being thrown little stones at, for the hyeanas to move.

    That should not overshadow, that the general standard of enclosures at Pairi Daiza is good, at times even great.

    But from what I have seen on pictures of the Bioparc Rome, I guess I have to vote for PD.
     
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  6. ShonenJake13

    ShonenJake13 Well-Known Member 10+ year member

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    It should also be mentioned Pairi Daiza also have Javan leopard, though only a single male at present.

    Having visited PD I can safely agree with @SabineB; though some of the animals draw the short straw exhibit-wise, they certainly have a wide variety of mid to high quality exhibits.
    Despite their over-the-top theming, Pairi Daiza is still one of the most interesting zoos I’ve visited. This coupled with what I’ve seen of Rome’s holdings makes it an easy choice for me. Pairi Daiza.
     
  7. TheGerenuk

    TheGerenuk Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    Well, Pairi Daiza is lucky to have a diverse collecition of carnivores for this match, so it got my vote. I also think Pairi Daiza would win if the category was ungulates, birds, or ectotherms.
     
  8. lintworm

    lintworm Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    Pairi Daiza should be punished based on their large carnivore holdings, but Rome isn't ready for that I am afraid.

    From memory only Giant panda and Cheetah have a nicely looking enclosure that is not too small. The Lions & hyena have boring smallish enclosures, the Asiatic black bear one doesn't look to different. The white tiger enclosure is way overthemed, and barely has any cover for the animals. The worst is however that the zoo brings in species, before they have a proper enclosure for them. The white tigers (and before the leopards) had to spend years in an insanely small cage (which was newly built around 2012), the same for the Giant otters, who were kept in an enclosure without enough water (I don't know the current situation though). This irrational bringing in of species that they can't care for properly is just bad an inexcusable for a zoo with the resources of Pairi Daiza.

    Many zoos in the coming rounds will be able to beat PD on large carnivores, but from memory Rome is not much better than PD. The Lion, Wolf and Brown bear enclosure are nice, but when I was there (10 years ago...) the Tiger were in small Hagenbeck style enclosures and the Leopards in small cages.
     
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  9. SabineB

    SabineB Well-Known Member

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    I think they are still in that glass bassin type enclosure at the foot of where the 'you have to pay extra to see expensive japanese fish'- house is next to the McD lookalike-diner.

    Apart from large carnivores, the shoebill endlosure in Pairi Daiza is great!
     
  10. ShonenJake13

    ShonenJake13 Well-Known Member 10+ year member

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    A lot of the enclosures at Pairi Daiza are better than most believe. I personally liked the orangutan, gorilla and wombat enclosures, although the former two have grossly overthemed indoor areas (volcanoes with no use of height, and an enormous marble temple). The shoebill aviary as mentioned above is great, as is the water buffalo and the crested macaque enclosures.
    However, amongst these pretty good enclosures we have the cages mentioned above, and the fact that, as lintworm correctly stated, the zoo brings in species long before they have an enclosure ready.
     
  11. ShonenJake13

    ShonenJake13 Well-Known Member 10+ year member

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    For anyone who's interested to hear more about PD, above is my review of it when I visited last July. My final consensus was that I liked it (at least, more than Planckendael), but it’s not hard to see why it receives so much criticism.
     
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  12. lintworm

    lintworm Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    Pairi Daiza is actually a zoo that grows more unimpressive with every new visit. It used to be an amazing bird park, with a bunch of mammals and a good reptile house. In 2010 the Cite des Immortels was an actual Chinese garden (and a huge one, with loads of crane species), The Terre des Origines did not exist yet. The Royaume de Ganesha was just opened, so no Orang utans, Komodo dragon and Wombat and only a few elephants...The Australian section was also not there yet. At that point the whole atmosphere was amazing as a combination between modern enclosures and many old elements. The bird collection was incredibly good at that point, but there were not many mammals. This was also before they started to become a real mainstream zoo...

    The + point for PD's theming compared with many other zoos, is that the artifacts are actually real, the Hindu temple in the Royaume de Ganesha is an active Hindu temple and the Chinese garden was constructed by Chinese. It is incredible how much this zoo has changed in the past 8 years alone, but not for the better imo, it has now lost most of it's charm and become completely overcrowded.

    I expect that in the coming rounds this Zoo will drop out, if not for large carnivores than for it's outdated way of treating elephants or fake gorilla volcano.
     
  13. littleRedPanda

    littleRedPanda Well-Known Member

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    Wicksteed is not a zoo
    However, you're still happy to recommend it :D
    Alicante to England, via Germany

    Why not Pairi Daiza, which is hard on it's way to become one of Europe's most significant zoos.
     
  14. lintworm

    lintworm Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    It is still a must see zoo and will remain one for quite some time. It is still completely unique and some parts are certainly impressive, but overall I am not too fond of most developments ;)
     
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  15. TZDugong

    TZDugong Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    :confused: Wait, there's a volcano in the Gorilla indoor exhibit, and a temple in the Wombat exhibit? Is there a specific reason why? I mean I'm all for a bit of theming, but this is ridiculous.
     
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  16. ShonenJake13

    ShonenJake13 Well-Known Member 10+ year member

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    When I said former two I was referring to orangutan and gorilla. The two bachelor groups of gorillas have indoor quarters inside a man-made volcano each, which though it makes more for an impressive sight is not used nearly as well as it could be (they don’t use the height at all for the animals).
    And one of the two groups of Sumatran orangutans has indoors inside an enormous marble temple, whilst the other has them inside a large Southeast Asian style wooden lodge. Again, impressive exhibitry but not necessary for animal holding.

    The wombats, though near a temple, have a perfectly adequate outdoor paddock, but their indoors is the real treat; it’s a burrow system built into a wall, the tunnels and chambers of which can be observed through glass.
     
  17. ShonenJake13

    ShonenJake13 Well-Known Member 10+ year member

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    Well the way it’s currently going it seems two of the most collectionist zoos in Europe will be going head to head; Moscow and Pairi Daiza...
     
  18. CGSwans

    CGSwans Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    I haven't quite given up on Hannover yet, which would give us two of the tackiest zoos instead. :p
     
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