Zoo News Digest 25th April 2019 (ZooNews 1019)
Photo by
Jörg Asmus
elvinhow@gmail.com
Dear Colleague,
So we have had some more Black Tiger cubs born in Vandalur Zoo in Chennai. There have been a few of these pseudo-melanistic cubs captive born in India since 2010, usually alongside white cubs. I would be extremely interested to know where the previous cubs are now and where the new ones will be going? I have no problems with white tigers or for that matter black tigers being born where they naturally occur....the genes are there. It is when people start to deliberately breed for colour that I see it as wrong. It strikes me that there a group of unscrupulous 'zoo' people who would give their eye teeth and a lot of money to get these animals so they can create the latest fashion animals for the zoo world. Perhaps the breeding is already taking place. It would take several years of inbreeding to create the next Frankentiger.
Two Tiger accidents in just a few days. They say these things come in threes...I hope not. I do hope though there are full investigations and we are all able to learn just what happened and so we can all learn. There is as always the inevitable debate as to whether it should be one or two keepers working carnivores. Personally I believe that one is better.
Working in Dubai for a few days. Back home to Thailand on Saturday. I will try and answer pending emails on my return.
"good zoos will not gain the credibility of their critics until they condemn the bad zoos wherever they are." Peter Dickinson
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If you are a subscriber to the email version then you probably knew this already. You would also know that ZooNews Digest pre-dates any of the others. It was there before FaceBook. It was there shortly after the internet became popular and was a 'Blog' before the word had been invented. ZooNews Digest reaches zoo people.
I remain committed to the work of GOOD zoos,
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Did You Know?
ZooNews Digest has over 109,500+ Followers on Facebook( and over 109,700 likes) and has a weekly reach often exceeding over 350,000 people? That ZooNews Digest has subscribers in over 900 Zoos in 155+ countries? That the subscriber list for the mail out reads like a 'Zoos Who's Who?'
If you are a subscriber to the email version then you probably knew this already. You would also know that ZooNews Digest pre-dates any of the others. It was there before FaceBook. It was there shortly after the internet became popular and was a 'Blog' before the word had been invented. ZooNews Digest reaches zoo people.
I remain committed to the work of GOOD zoos,
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Animal Welfare: a top priority, but how on earth do we
measure it?
‘Animal welfare’ is now
included in the majority of zoo mission statements, it’s fundamental in
activist campaigns and government agendas, and it’s a top priority for animal
caretakers- all of which should be seen as great progress.
But as demands increase for
evidence that animals are experiencing good welfare, the question that many
facilities are therefore facing is: how on earth do we measure it?
https://zoospensefull.com/2019/04/22/animal-welfare-a-top-priority-but-how-on-earth-do-we-measure-it
Condition improving for zookeeper attacked by tiger at Topeka Zoo
The director of the Topeka Zoo says a zookeeper who was attacked by a Sumatran tiger remains in intensive care but her prognosis for recovery is good.
The zookeeper was attacked Saturday while in the outdoor tiger habitat of Sanjiv, a 7-year-old male tiger.
The Topeka Capital-Journal reports zoo director Brendan Wiley said the zookeeper was talking Saturday night. Wiley said she remained in intensive care Sunday but could be transferred out of the unit soon.
https://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/ct-tiger-attack-topeka-zoo-20190420-story.html
A zookeeper suffered 'lacerations and punctures' in a tiger attack at the zoo in Topeka, Kansas
A zookeeper is recovering in the hospital after she was attacked Saturday morning by a tiger at the Topeka, Kansas, zoo.
The woman and a 7-year-old male Sumatran tiger named Sanjiv were both in the tiger habitat shortly after the zoo opened when the tiger "essentially tackled our keeper," Zoo Director Brendan Wiley said at an afternoon press conference.
The zookeeper suffered "lacerations and punctures to the back of the head, neck, back and one arm," Wiley told reporters.
Wildlife expert: There is no question why this happened VIDEO
Bengal
tiger bites former Las Vegas entertainer at Arizona nature park
Johnathan Kraft, a former performer on the Las
Vegas Strip and founder of Keepers of the Wild Nature Park, was bitten by
Bengal Tiger Bowie Monday, April 22, during a severe thunderstorm.
According to a release posted on Facebook, the
incident occurred during a period of heavy rain and lightning as well as hail.
Kraft, who is also the director of the nature
park in Valentine, Arizona located roughly 140 miles southeast of Las Vegas,
was concerned for the tiger’s safety and was in the process of shifting Bowie’s
gates to allow the ti
Vol 34, No 4 (2019): April
Fourteen
animals were saved in a month
On March 20th, 2019, Save Vietnam’s Wildlife
successfully rescued two Chinese pangolins from Song Thanh Nature Reserve,
Quang Nam Province. Beside some minor injuries and dehydrated, they are in a
good condition and now under our care at the rescue center in Cuc Phuong
national park.
"Zoo
Nerding" in Western Australia: The wonders of Perth Zoo!
I am
currently doing my PhD at the University of Birmingham, funded by the UK's
Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), via CENTA, a consortium of
universities and research centres. As part of my PhD, I am required to do a
work placement, doing something relevant to my career goals but significantly
different from my PhD project. When the placement was introduced during my PhD
induction back in October last year, I remember jumping
Antwerp
ZOO encourages mating of penguins with a special light effect
By installing special lamps in Antwerp Zoo
that show the sexual maturity of the king penguins, the zoo hopes to stimulate
the breeding process.
Penguins see differently from humans. By
installing special lamps, the king penguins in Antwerp Zoo will now see pink
and purple spots on the beaks of their peers as soon as they have reached
sexual maturity, just like they would in nature. The effect should better match
pairs and stimulate the breeding success of the endangered species. The
experiment is unique in Europe.
The light emitting plasma lamps (lep-lamps)
contain UV-light, which brings out the pink and purple spot naturally, previous
research has indicated. "As the first zoo in Europe to do this, we are
setting a trend," said Jan Dams, coordinator of animal care at the zoo.
Are
dingoes just feral dogs?
Australia’s dingoes are both iconic and
shrouded in mystery: were the dogs’ ancestors, introduced to the continent at
least 5,000 years ago by unknown Asian seafarers, domesticated? Should
modern-day dingoes be considered feral or wild, just another dog or a species
unto themselves? These questions are central to the fate of dingoes and
Australia’s biodiversity.
Last year the government of Western Australia,
the state encompassing the nation’s western third, declared that dingoes will
no longer be considered native fauna. Instead they’ll be classified as
non-native wild dogs, no different than feral pets. That designation will allow
them to be killed in unlimited numbers.
Birds
of prey stamps released by Royal Mail
The new stamp collection features original
images produced by British photographer Tim Flach, who has taken a mix of
portraits of these majestic birds, showing them close-up and in flight.
“I think it’s great that Royal Mail has chosen
to put a focus on the birds of prey that we have in the UK,” says Flach. “I’m
really mindful of the fact that we’ve never been more separated from nature.
And, the stamps really let us better understand what these animals are.”
The defining characteristic of birds of prey
is that they are carnivores. Raptors catch and carry their food with their feet
and have exceptionally good binocular vision.
A
rare antelope is being killed to make $20,000 scarves
Giovanni Albertini is accustomed to opulence.
At this checkpoint on the Switzerland-Italy border, a two-hour drive from
Milan, he spends his days evaluating well-coiffed travelers and scouring their
Gucci and Louis Vuitton luggage for contraband. He and his Swiss border patrol
colleagues have assessed diamonds, pricey wines, and caviar, among other
luxuries.
But the drab scarf spread out before him now
would not immediately impress. Wrinkled, beige, speckled with tiny, crinkly
hairs, its only embellishment was a small fringe at each end. And yet this
seemingly unremarkable wrap could be another valuable piece of contraband.
UK government supports global action to fight illegal
wildlife trade
Schemes to combat poaching
and protect species like marine turtles and grey parrots from being illegally
traded, are among fourteen new projects set to benefit from a UK government
fund to combat wildlife criminals around the globe.
Ministers have today marked
Earth Day (22 April) by announcing that the schemes will each receive a share
in £4.6 million from the Illegal Wildlife Trade Challenge Fund.
Conservators
Center seeks healing after death of intern
Conservators Center Director Mindy Stinner
thinks of Alex Black every day.
On December 30, 2018, Black, a 22-year-old
husbandry intern, was attacked and killed by a lion during a routine cleaning.
The lion, Matthai, was then shot dead. He’d been born at the center in 2004 and
spent his entire life there.
Sitting in her office nearly four months
later, Stinner recalls the days and weeks that followed the tragedy.
“It was absolutely the worst day of my life,”
she says, “and I feel like the worst day in the life of the Conservators
Center. It was devastating for Alex Black’s
Study
shows zoos and aquariums dramatically increase information needed to help save
species
Despite volumes of data currently available on
mankind, it is surprising how little we know about other species. A paper
published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences (PNAS) confirms that critical information, such as fertility and
survival rates, is missing from global data for more than 98 percent of known
species of mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians.
Conservators
Center seeks healing after death of intern
Conservators Center Director Mindy Stinner
thinks of Alex Black every day.
On December 30, 2018, Black, a 22-year-old
husbandry intern, was attacked and killed by a lion during a routine cleaning.
The lion, Matthai, was then shot dead. He’d been born at the center in 2004 and
spent his entire life there.
Sitting in her office nearly four months
later, Stinner recalls the days and weeks that followed the tragedy.
“It was absolutely the worst day of my life,”
she says, “and I feel like the worst day in the life of the Conservators
Center. It was devastating for Alex Black’s family. Her loss of life was truly
horrible and we were, quite honestly, emotionally shocked and numb for a little
bit because it’s just such an incredible trauma. And we really had to turn all
of our attention to making sure we knew what had
SeaWorld
publishes decades of orca data to help wild whales
The endangered killer whales of the Pacific
Northwest live very different lives from orcas in captivity.
They swim up to 100 miles (161 kilometers) a
day in pursuit of salmon, instead of being fed a steady diet of baitfish and
multivitamins. Their playful splashing awes and entertains kayakers and
passengers on Washington state ferries instead of paying theme park customers
How
do we decide which species are endangered or threatened?
The eagle’s populations once dwindled to fewer
than 500 nesting pairs, thanks in part to the widespread use of a pesticide
called DDT, which thinned their eggs, as well as habitat loss and hunting. The
U.S. banned DDT in 1972, and the bird was protected under the U.S. Endangered
Species Act of 1973. Thirty four years later, bald eagles had recovered
sufficiently to be removed from listing.
In
the Shadows of Lions
Behind every image of African wildlife on
social media, there is a story. Some stories put a spotlight on the tireless
conservation efforts made to protect these animals, while others show a dark
side, especially when it comes to unethical and misleading tourist activities.
10
steps of a bear checkup
Dr. Jorg Mayer annually takes a group of
students out to Bear Hollow Zoo in Athens to perform an annual bear checkup.
The checkup typically takes place a month or
so before the bears hibernate for winter and a lot of preventive medicine
happens during this exam, according to Mayer, associate professor of zoological
and exotic animal medicine at the University of Georgia’s College of Veterinary
Medicine.
So what exactly is involved in this annual
exam?
New
Sydney Zoo ruffles feathers of neighbouring Featherdale Wildlife Park
A cage-free zoo set to open in western Sydney
this year has again ruffled the feathers of a rival outdoor wildlife
attraction, less than a year after its out-of-court settlement with Taronga Zoo
over the right to use the name "Sydney Zoo".
Sydney Zoo, a new $36-million development in
the Western Sydney Parklands at Bungarribee near Eastern Creek, is now in the
midst of a tussle with the 47-year-old Featherdale Wildlife Park - and cuddles
with koalas are at the centre of it all.
The
most important threats to brown bear populations in Iran
Iran is a vast country with an area of
1,623,779 km2 in which there are 164 mammal species including the Asiatic black
bear and brown bear. Human-bear conflict is the main reason for the brown bear
number reduction and range collapse in this country. In this short article, I
summarize the most important threats to brown bear populations in Iran:
https://www.tehrantimes.com/news/434772/The-most-important-threats-to-brown-bear-populations-in-Iran
MORGAN and ULA
Orca Morgan, a well-known name that has
regularly appeared at VTL Photography. In 2014, 2015, and 2016 we visited
Morgan in Loro Parque to see how she was doing. In recent years there has been
much to do around the killer whale, and it still is. In the meantime a lot has
changed for Morgan, she has become a lot bigger and she is the mother of little
Ula. Mid January , reports came out in which activists claimed that little Ula
was possibly seriously ill. So it's high time for a new update!
The
Tapanuli orangutan: Status, threats, and steps for improved conservation
Ever since the Tapanuli orangutan (Pongo
tapanuliensis) was described two years ago (Nater et al., 2017) it has
frequently been in the news for two primary reasons. First, because of the
excitement generated by the discovery of the first new extant great ape species
since 1929. Second, because of the immediate threat posed to the new species by
the development of a hydrodam to generate electricity (Sloan, Supriatna,
Campbell, Alamgir, & Laurance, 2018). As the species has only been
described recently there is no paper that summarizes its status and threats
even though some of that information is available from a previous study where
this species was still considered a population of the Sumatran orangutan (Pongo
abelii) (Wich et al., 2016). In this letter, we aim to remedy this gap by
providing a succinct overview of the status of and threats to the Tapanuli
orangutan, as we
Work
with endangered animals is insurance policy for future, zoo says
Hamilton Zoo, which is celebrating its 50th
anniversary, says its work to protect endangered species with its breeding
programme is more important now than it has ever been.
It was founded by Murray and Gloria Powell in
1969 as the Hilldale Game Park, primarily to raise pheasants.
Later, in 1981, it was taken over by the
Hamilton City Council.
Hamilton Zoo now houses over 600 native and
exotic animals and last year saw 140,000 visitors through the gates.
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/work-endangered-animals-insurance-policy-future-zoo-says
'It
is a rollercoaster': looking after 4000 animals in Taronga Zoo's wildlife
hospital
It's not an easy job looking after over 4000
animals, but for the 17 staff members at Taronga Zoo's wildlife hospital, it's
a rewarding job.
The day starts at 7am with a team meeting
followed by checking-up on the injured animals or preparing them for release,
as well as yearly health checks of the entire zoo population. Hospital staff
also care for another 1400 animals annually brought in by the public, including
blue tongue lizards, red belly snakes and rainbow lorikeets.
Costa
Rica sanctuary still saving sloths after quarter of a century
It's pretty surprising to see a 27-year-old
jump into her mother's arms and insist on being held like a baby.
At the Sloth Sanctuary outside of Cahuita,
Costa Rica, though, such a sight is ordinary. Particularly when the 27-year-old
is a sloth named Buttercup and the mother in question is a human.
Best
Practice for Hand Rearing Lions and Tigers - Gail Hedberg Presentation
The
Heartland Zoo Tragedy Everyone Forgot
The names of the three fugitive chimpanzees
hunted down, shot, and left to bleed out on the baking Great Plains by a
well-armed posse were Tyler, Jimmy Joe, and Reuben. Reuben’s loss hit the
hardest; he was the original celebrity chimp of Royal, Nebraska (pop. 63). The
lone survivor, Ripley, enjoyed his freedom on a local neighbor’s tire swing in
a scene simultaneously Rockwellian and Orwellian; he was returned safely to his
cage at the zoo. Fourteen years later, the man behind it all, Dick Haskin,
lives with the painful memories of the primate massacre.
Joy,
one of Houston Zoo's baby elephants, has recovered from a difficult case of
herpes
For more than a week, Houston Zoo keepers were
unsure if Joy, one of their youngest Asian elephants, was going to survive.
She had contracted the herpes virus, called
EEHV (elephant endotheliotropic herpesvirus), the zoo announced Friday — a
virus that afflicts both Asian and African elephants across the globe and has a
85 percent mortality rate.
How
poachers of this rare frog became its protectors
In Peru, there’s a drink that some call frog
juice. It’s a traditional preparation, made of raw, skinned frogs blended with
ingredients such as maca root and honey. This “tonic” is mostly sold as an
aphrodisiac, though it’s also claimed to cure everything from asthma to
osteoporosis. (No scientific evidence exists for its efficacy.)
The frog of choice is the Lake Titicaca water
frog. Things have become so dire for this once common amphibian (which got the
nickname “scrotrum frog” from the many folds of its skin) tha
2
black, 1 white tiger cubs at Vandalur zoo
Two black tiger cubs and a white tiger cub are
the new attractions at the Aringar Anna Zoological Park in Vandalur.
According to a press release from the park, a
female white tigress Namrutha sired with a male tiger Nagula, which has the
white gene. Three cubs were born to Namrutha -- two females and one male.
Countries
home to Saiga antelopes develop new roadmap to save the species
Range States have agreed on a set of concrete
conservation priorities guiding the work under the Memorandum of Understanding
(MOU) Concerning the Restoration, Conservation and Sustainable Use of Saiga
Antelopes (Saiga spp.) up to 2025.
The agreement came at a workshop held from 1-4
April and jointly organized by CMS and CITES as well as the International
Academy for Nature Conservation of the German Federal Agency for Nature
Conservation (BfN INA) with funding from the German Ministry of the
Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU).
IF
YOU CAN INTERACT WITH THEM IT IS NOT CONSERVATION: Fake sanctuaries and naive
tourists
I was 21 when taken by ignorance and naivety,
I left to volunteer in a famous sanctuary of baboons and cheetahs in Namibia. I
do not deny it: what had prompted me to have that experience, was the idea of
being able to sleep with the monkeys and being able to pet the cheetahs; on
the other hand, what did I know, 5 years ago of what was behind these
interactions? Behind these places?
A
decade of efforts to save the world’s loneliest turtle
The last known female Yangtze giant softshell
turtle (Rafetus swinhoei) died during a fifth artificial insemination last
Saturday in Suzhou Zoo in China's eastern Jiangsu Province, signifying the
defeat of efforts to sustain this endangered species.
A joint team made up of domestic and
international experts from the zoo, the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and
the Turtle Survival Alliance (TSA) is working on the exact cause of death.
Aquarium
dolphins’ move from Baltimore may be delayed
It looks like Baltimore’s dolphins may be
around for a little longer than expected.
The National Aquarium in Baltimore announced
plans in 2016 to move its Atlantic bottlenose dolphins out of the Marine Mammal
Pavilion on Inner Harbor Pier 4 and into a first-of-its-kind North American
dolphin sanctuary by the end of 2020, in an effort to provide “an environment
in which they can thrive.”
At the time, 2020 seemed a long way off. But
with that deadline now less than two years away, aquarium president and CEO
John Racanelli says they may need more time.
Racanelli said the aquarium has still not
found a location to create its desired protected seaside sanctuary for the
dolphins, which could hold up the move. “It might be an extra year,” he said.
“We want to do it right.”
Racanelli said the aquarium has focused on
possible sites in the Florida Keys,
A
Bulgarian vulture's odyssey into Yemeni war zone
Nelson was in a tight corner, tied up and
imprisoned by men who believed he was a spy. It didn't look good.
When he was captured, they found a satellite
tracker attached to his leg, more sophisticated than much of the equipment they
had in Taiz, a town on the front line of Yemen's catastrophic war.
Nelson, they decided, was transmitting
military secrets.
In any war it is bad news to be accused of
spying. In Yemen, an isolated, dusty and desperate place, suspicions can race
round groups of armed men and harden minds. Even if you're a vulture.
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After more than 50 years working in private, commercial and National zoos in the capacity of keeper, head keeper and curator Peter Dickinson started to travel. He sold house and all his possessions and hit the road. He has traveled extensively in Turkey, Southern India and much of South East Asia before settling in Thailand. In his travels he has visited well over 200 zoos and many more before 'hitting the road' and writes about these in his blog http://zoonewsdigest.blogspot.com/Hubpages http://hubpages.com/profile/Peter+Dickinson
Peter earns his living as an independent international zoo consultant, critic and writer. Until recently working as Curator of Penguins in Ski Dubai. United Arab Emirates. He describes himself as an itinerant zoo keeper, one time zoo inspector, a dreamer, a traveler, an introvert, a people watcher, a lover, a storyteller, a thinker, a cosmopolitan, a writer, a hedonist, an explorer, a pantheist, a gastronome, sometime fool, a good friend to some and a pain in the butt to others.
"These are the best days of my life"
"These are the best days of my life"
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