female indian rhino in australia! » Western Plains Zoo

31-10-2006

your theory is a very good one glyn. it represents a way in which the open-range zoos might be able to "bulk-out" with feral and large-zoo-populations species in order to keep a generous amount of animals on display. but in all honesty, unless our open-range zoos in particular can manage to overturn the artiodactyl ban - then i reckon they are in big trouble. eventually, even the giraffes and few viable antelopes will become inbred and need new stock. i actually think its rediculous our taxpayer-funded zoos in particular can't get special permission to bring in zoo animals from overseas. they could transform the elephant facility on the cocos islands into a generic hoofstock quarrintine facility and lobby the government hard to let them use it. but imagine how much more it going to cost to import, with every artidactyl now requiring a charter to the cocos!!!! we'll have to import in bulk to make it worth while - for example a consortium of zoos all covering the cost to bringing in large herds in one go...

i'm not particuarly impressed with the ARAZPA collection plan, with certain species being favoured over others that makes no sense to me.

whilst i can understand some zoos frustrations at taronga/dubbo freely importing non-program species whenever they feel like it, the other side of the argument is this. dubbo already are a very successful and active member of the white rhino breeding program. its not like they bring in other species at the expense of this one. so why shouldn't they focus on an additional species (or more as it so be) of rhino if they wish? i'm sure dubbo could argue that they are not going to let other zoos lack of participation hold them back. and in a way i think this is fair enough...

01-11-2006

i think that the rhino program is best viewed in context. if you looked at all the larger vertabrates from antelope and deer, to rhinos and giraffes just as space fillers, then the collapse of the artiodactyl tag will open up 'space' and resources (keepers, feed costs, enclosure spaces) etc for the management of other species.
so in the future, resources that may have went in to managing non-viable herds of bongo and barbary sheep could go into the indian rhino.
oposition to the indian rhino program came from within arazpa. they criticised the lack of regional coordination and space which leads to non-viable programs. essentially, the indian rhino is an example of what this report is all about....

21-04-2007

Zoos should start to move away from hybridising Giraffes. Chester and Longleat already have had sucess. Longleat has had over 100 baby Giraffes.

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Jonathan Beilby-www.zooscene.co.uk

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22-04-2007

welcome to our international. please realise this forum started out as a mainly australian focused zoo site, so i think we need to explain something. in australia, we have quarantine laws. this means hoofed animals, like giraffes or antelope cant be imported.
our zoos are stuck with what theyve already got, in this case, mainly hybrid giraffes and a couple of pure-bred rothschilds (plus bongo) imported when the rules changed ever so briefly a few years back. our antelope collections are a reflection of our stringent quarantine laws and historical lack of cooperation in managing antelope populations in this country.european antelope collections are spectacular, but one could say, a bit more relevent to those country's problems

22-04-2007

The Zoo which was instrumental in first breeding this species in any quantity was Basel in Switzerland. The Original San Diego male came from this source.
Basel have sent Indian rhino calves to many zoos worldwide since they first started breeding them in the 1950's(originally from a pair, then a trio)

San Diego WAP having much more space can keep much larger numbers of Indian rhino than Basel ever could, so may have produced more zooborns overall.

22-04-2007

Basel has recently done up their rhino house. The keepers ahve a good working relationship with them.

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Jonathan Beilby-www.zooscene.co.uk

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22-04-2007

Basel has kept this species continuously since the 1950's when their first pair arrived from Kaziranga,Assam. Whipsnade have also kept the species for a similar length of time, also continuously. The first calf bred at Whipsnade,(female) was sent with the first calf bred at Basel(male) to form a new pair in USA at(I think) Milwaukee- but that pair never bred. Basel's 2nd calf, a female, was retained for breeding, first with her father and when he died, a new, unrelated bull was obtained from Berlin Zoo. Several zoos in Europe have rhinos bred at, or descended from, those 4 Basel Indian rhinos. That includes the male that was at Chester, Gaidi, via his father who was born at Amsterdam but who descends from a Basel bred animal.Complicated or what?

I saw pictures of Basel's outdoor enclosure-its now covered with Bark mulch to protect their feet better.

23-04-2007

When I went in....2005 I think it was, It was a boiling day and they were hosing down the 2 females and their babies. The male baby has gone to edinburgh and the female will soon be going to Chester.

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Jonathan Beilby-www.zooscene.co.uk

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Australian Quarantine
23-04-2007

Are there any animals , birds , whatever , that Australia would accept only from NZ -- given the fact that we also have strict biosecurity regulations ?

just wondering .......

23-04-2007

Yes, plenty, but I don't have the list handy.

23-04-2007

giraffes for starters!

24-04-2007

i'm not sure if even giraffe are allowed in any more.

24-04-2007

only from new zealnd i belive, and even they can only reeally source from oz, a catch 22 really, but i read somehwere nz quarrintine says they can get giraffe sometimes from canada and europe

24-04-2007

I'm presuming that both of these young rhinos were sired by Jaffna, the bull who is currently on loan to Whipsnade and fathered the female calf 'Asha' born there on January 1st this year. In which case, here's an interesting situation in that he will soon have three offspring living in the UK, -one at each of Whipsnade, Edinburgh and Chester,- though the latter two were neither concieved nor born in the UK.

26-04-2007

I'm not saying for a second that I agree with Australasian zoos keeping the two Indian Rhino that we have, but I've just spent a couple of days at Rotterdam Zoo where they have a young Indian Rhino, born last year. Pretty damned cute, I have to say!!

The exhibit is a little ordinary, but acceptablefor a metropolitan zoo. They have the pair an the youngster, and it looked like an additional animal as well, but I couldn't be sure.