ZSL London Zoo Zsl tv

I thought i'd start a thread where some of the numerous videos from ZSL TV can be posted.

YouTube - ZSLvideo's Channel

YouTube - Mathilda the friendly giant tortoise
Where do London keep the tortoises? I vaguely remember them keeping one in the Komodo Dragon house and the video does look like it is in there...

 

Hi
yes, Mathilda is in the Komodo House, BUT there are plans to build a separate house for Galapagos giant tortoises next door for the new year.

 

im slightly confused about the komodo dragon house, how many adult dragosn do they have at the moment?

 

London have 1.1 komodo dragons.

 

so if im right the two adults live together and the giant tortoise lives next door?

 

I went last week and they didn't have two adults, but they had an adult male and a juvenile female who was born there. The aldabra tortoise lives in the empty females enclosure. What actually happened to her?

 

Didn't she attempt to climb the dividing wall, but fell and died...

I seem to remember reading that somewhere, will try to dig up the link.

Edit: http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/london-zoos-komodo-dragon-dies-scaling-wall-557396.html

It's from 2004, so i think it may have been a seperate incident...

 

That's pretty sad.
Wonder if they'll get another adult female.

 

Just found another link which said that the female died.

Dawkins on Komodo Dragon’s Virgin Birth | Evolution Diary

"For a while, mysterious stories have been surfacing of captive females in zoos producing apparently fatherless offspring. For example, New Scientist reported on 25th April 2006 that Sungai, a female Komodo dragon in the London Zoo, now dead, laid fertile eggs which hatched into male offspring, despite not having seen a male for two and a half years."

So that's 'Nina' and 'Sungai' both dying within a couple of years of each other...

 

ohh thats a shame so they got a female in with the male?

and whats happened to the others that were born?

 

No, the young female was in her own enclosure near the exit to the dragon house.

 

last time i went they had several little ones there, have they moved to other collections?

 

I would guess so, I think they only had the one.

 

I think the juvenile female is the offspring of the adult male . Sungai also produced a fertile clutch of eggs as well as the clutch that produced the all-male 'clones' .

I remember reading some time ago that the 2 females at Chester Zoo were the only mature females left in Europe . One of these has now been moved - to Skansen ? There does seem to be a major problem of mortalities , particularly with females . I wonder how many of the males born at Chester and Regent's Park have been reared so far . I did see a couple of reasonable sized young at Chester on my last visit .

 

They have moved them off show-now, chester are listed as 4.1, with one born in the last 12 months. So there is at least two that survived, possible more if they have moved any to other collections.

 

They have moved some on to other collections while they have also lost a few.

 

The first female was the one that escaped and died. Does anyone know how the second female died? The current stock at London are indeed the adult male and a juvenile (his offspring) kept in a nearby indoor exhibit. The tortoise occupies the old females enclosure.

 

thanks for that, will the zoo be trusted with another female?

 

Seeing as they bred from them and are one of the major zoological organisations in the UK I would expect there to be another female at some point. Unless that is the reason why they have retained a single juvenile female....