Hi everyone, here are my pictures from my visit to Whipsnade Zoo yesterday. As you can see Spike the male, spent all day in the same spot, like the majority of the others in the lion group there ontop of their hill right in the centre of the enclosure. This not only gives them a view of their enclosure, but of the Oryx enclosure next to them, as well as probably the entire downs that the park is situated on. So like most cats they like to have a look around, and they certainly get the opportunity to do so where they are!
The male Spike pictured below, is a cousin of Zuri, and spent the majority of his time sat down making pictures of him from a point of view of comparison very tricky! Here are my posts with photos from my visits in February this year, and information about these lions is on the Meet the lions page.
It is possible to not only see the lions next to their perimeter fence and in the very large glass viewing area but also from the other side of the oryx enclosure, where their hill looks out too. It is a fantastic sight, and you never really appreciate it in any photos that you can take. But seeing a group of lions over looking a herd of oryx on an English sunny evening, is truly fantastic.
Below are some pictures of the enclosure, the enclosure 'Lions of the Serengeti' is in itself a lot larger than you think, but I have never seen the lions use the wooded side, it actually takes up a fair amount of mature woodland, but it is generally completely left alone. Perhaps they use it more in the cooler weather as they will patrol around, but as of yet I have only ever seen them use it in February when it was snowing. The majority of their summer days seem to be spent basking in the sun, which I do not blame them for!
It is easy to see in some of the enclosure pictures how obvious the glass viewing area is, the windows almost look blue from a distance, and it is covered in sand like the themed area of the exhibit. In my opinion it is a little too cheesy for my liking, but hey ho it seems to work, and the lions definately do not mind having the visitors that close, quite often on my visits they have been sat right down by the glass, enjoying a nice snooze, and a few are generally laid back right against the glass without a care in the World.
And here is that fantastic view shown in the pictures above, again perhaps ruined by the rather block feel house, and the very dominanting public viewing area, but the lions definately seem happy. Another good point especially for photographers is that when you are in the viewing area to the 'Lions of the Serengeti' because of the mound you get no fences in the way of the lions for about 2/3 of the view in there. Only the sky, which will hopefully be blue if the weather is nice! The whole idea of a sunken fence inbetween the lion enclosure and the oryx paddock, is still visible, so in a way ruins the whole idea, but you still get a superb view of the lions, and it is a zoo so in a sense you almost expect to see fences, here there and everywhere, so it is really not noticed too much.
'Lions of the Serengeti' does a superb job and catering for the small group of Adult male Spike, and a collection of realted lionesseses and castrated males giving a group of seven strong. Not the biggest group of captive lions in the wild, but compared to most zoos quite a healthy number, the only zoo taking up the Safari Park practice of keeping a trio of castrated males within the pride. The theming in the exhibit is not compeltely over the top either, plenty of sand is laid down for the visitors, as well as many educational features too, so plenty of learning can be done for the younger (and older!) generation.
So Whipsnade's lion enclosure is of a very decent size, indoor accomodation looks large too, and it has a fantastic view and clever fencing, but is it World leading? Not quite, as far as I can work out there is no seperate outdoor holding which would be useful especially for introducing more lions in the future, it takes a hell of a lot to create something like that for lions, but lions don't really need that sort of thing when kept in stable groups, they are incredibly easy as far as animals go to keep happy, and these lions at Whipnade are so happy, that they don't seem to make use of the space that they are given, typical! My only criticism however is that the boundry fences to the proper lion fence is huge, 10 feet in places atleast, and if the lions do come up to the wooded area, it is impossible to get a close distance to them. And a huge thumbs up to them for not over breeding their lions, it could be so easy to have more cubs, but ZSL know that they do not have the space and they do not so so, simple but I something I think that needs to be commended.
James
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