Visiting, Zoos

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22121, 17 June 1937, Page 4 (Supplement)

Visiting, Zoos

"Would you like to go to the zoo?" the visitor to Wellington is asked. Now you may have serious objections to zoos; you may think that it is cruel to cage animals, that it is cruel to keep tropical animals on a hillside where the bitter winds jeer at the meek and mild sun in winter and buffet its warmth unceasingly in summer. You may think that you should be able to see these animals in well-coloured picture books or in films that have been taken in their native homes. But as there is a zoo to see you will probably go to see it. You will criticise with more knowledge and you will probably be interested in even the more unpleasant things you see.

You pay your shilling and climb ! the small hill. And there is the first cage. The label says wombat, Australia. This one is hiding in his kennel; or perhaps not hiding but merely snoozing. He seems quite bored with life and cannot summon i energy to do more than blink one eye when a peanut is thrown in. You are told that the wombat is a marsupial, that is, an animal that ' carries its helpless young in a pouch until the baby is strong enough to manage life alone. In the cage, which is quite bare of grass, there is a drinking dish with water and strewn along the netting there are a few remains of vegetables. The creature lives on these and on many kinds of roots. In his natural state the wombat lives in a burrow much like a rabbit burrow, only bigger, and many of his friends and relations live with him in a colony of burrows making warrens. At night time all the older wombats go out hunting for food. If they live near crops they can be a great nuisance to farmers, for they root about to get at the tender parts just below the surface of the soil. In vegetable gardens they are most happy; and next day the gardener is most unhappy. They go on all fours but can sit more or less upright; then they look like smallish stout bears with their fat faces and paunches and with their shaggy coarse fur of a dirty brownish colour. This fur is used in the manufacture of some rugs. When you move on from the wombat's cage he is probably still asleep, looking something like a fat and good tempered grannie curled into a space of about two feet. After the dismal failure of your generosity with peanuts thrown to Mr Wombat you will be delighted with the monkeys and their gay eagerness to clutch every shell you

hold out to them. The sight of those long arms with the bluishblack hands grabbing at you through the mesh of the netting will probably give you the giggles. In a little time you will wonder if there is such a thing as a satisfied monkey anywhere on earth. Certainly there is no such thing in the Wellington zoo. The only pauses are for cracking the shell and stuffing the two nuts into the wide grinning mouth. The bright eyes dart here and there and monkeys hurriedly leave one part of the fence for another. You will wonder why. And then you will see a large bossylooking fellow coming along in a lordly manner. If you have any feelings for the downtrodden you

will say "No, Mr Superior, you stop bullying and then you'll get some nuts" and you will follow your nimble little friend along the wire and will perhaps be gratified to hear a grunt that obviously is monkey for "thank you." As long as the nut supply lasts .these busy creatures have no thoughts for anything else; but walk away a little and look back and you will see them all busy at another job—they can find no more nuts so they get back to their half-time occupation of scratching. And if you are lucky you might overhear the beginning of a jabbered conversation. It all sounds very important and urgent and may be, too, for all humans can tell.

Beyond the many monkey cages with the sleek, small monkeys, and the larger, unpleasant looking ones are the cages with the lordly and cruel looking vultures. Almost as still as statues they' stand on their perches, their huge wings outstretched and their angry heads lifted upwards. These birds are scornful and unfriendly and do not encourage the visitor to stand by their cages for long. On the other side of the road is a more pleasant sight. Here are owls sitting very owlishly in the trees growing in their pens. They'blink their eyes and look hunched up about the shoulders, just as the picture books have shown them for so many years. They may not take much notice and they may not show off for you as the keas and parrots down below do, but they make you feel that you are welcome to stand and stare for as long as you please. They are more dignified than the brazen keas in the cage down the hill where a brilliant family of many kinds of parrots live in noisy friendliness. The colours are magnificent and the

antics of the birds most amusing. You will be gazing with pleasure, when suddenly out of the corner of your eye you may catch sight of a flutter. Then you will be entranced, for the peacock has come strolling along—for he does not live in a cage it seems—and is standing with his astonishingly beautiful tail spreading fanwise and closing slowly. He struts a little and if he can understand your admiration, he should be a well pleased bird. You see pheasants and strange birds with ridiculously long tails of vivid colours, kiwis and birds with queer turban arrangements of feathers on their heads and others with peculiar feet and leg decorations; but always you will be turning round in the hope that the peacock might spread his tail again. Elephant House On a high rise is a large domed building that perhaps is meant to suggest India. This is the elephant house. It is dark within and the floor is strewn with yellow straw. Soon you will become used to the dim light, and you see that the elephant is chained by one foot to a stake in the midst of the large floor space. You stand beyond a railing and throw peanuts even if you are not quite sure whether elephants eat such things. But there goes the flexible trunk nosing about in the straw, and suddenly you see that the huge animal has picked up the nut in that snuffling trunk and with a swing has sent it down the strange mouth. One tusk is broken, the other beautifully curved and cream in colour. If you are lucky the elephant will be brought out to ride. A large saddle with two seats goes on the back and soon you climb up on steps and are helped on to the animal's back. At strange commands the elephant moves about the courtyard by the house and brings you back to the steps. It is necessary to watch that trunk, for as it sweeps about in search of food, it might easily tip off your hat. There is a huge bath with steps leading down to its floor; at this time of the year it is empty, but in summer the elephant spend 3 happy hours wallowing in its cool depths. As you go away you feel particularly sad for the poor crinkled elephant with its little eyes and its searching trunk shut up in that dim house and chained to a straw covered floor.

Even the lions and tigers maka you feci that perhaps they can put up with captivity better than the sad and lonely elephant can. The bars of their cages are very thick and the floors are of some material that looks like asphalt. And a$

the lion walks up and down, up and down, beside the bars of his cage his large and padded feet make, continual soft brushing noises dragging over the floor. The lioness lies beside the tree trunk which stands very much scratched and clawed in the middle of the cage. After a time she gets up and moves backwards and forwards near her, lord. Their heads brush, they quite gently mouth each other's necks and then they both yawn with hugs and gaping yawns Then again thef. begin their pacing up and down, restlessly and watchfully, but without any appearance of purposefulness. Long, long ago they have lost their idea that they might getj •somewhere if they keep on walkingJ It is the same with the Jigex* next door. Shuffle, shuffle, pad pad* backwards and forwards they They all have scars on their bodies and if the tigers look more beautiiui and more healthy than the lions it is because of their handsome, gleaming coats of short hair. The coats of the lions are slightly long, and shaggy, and the colour is drab and not vivid as it is in the tigers. There is a young lion cub with a few spots remaining on his head: the visitor learns that lions are born looking more like the young ol leopards than like the children lions might be expected to have. Behind the tiger's cage is one for the puma, the most pleasant animai to look at in the whole zoo. How beautifully lithe and graceful it is, this large cat with the contented manner. Its colour ranges from mole to fawn and its coat is sleeK and very healthy looking. A pleasant cat, though rather large for a pet; it is said to eat sheep ana other farm animals, but will nox attack man unless it is provoked. But the visitor is quite glad of the bars, and feels safer talking to Kip* ling's yellow dog dingo who lives next door, very alert and sharpnosed, and certainly yellow u» colour.

Your last visit before you go home is to the dens of the brown bears. and the lonely powr bear. He is the saddest creature in the zoo. It is a perishing day, but he is much too hot. He strides up and down along his narrow stieu at a good four miles an hour, ana he does not pause when he c°«"» to the end but turns immediately and strides some more. The restlessness of the lions and tigers is nothing compared to this, roor bear! If he had a telescope ana looked out to sea at the end of eacn journey up and down he imgi" look like an old-fashioned sea captain. But he has nothing amusing about him; only his long sna .f% coat and his huge feet with their perpetual plodding and his long nose stuck out ahead as if determination and perseverance woum surely take him somewhere at last.