Ostrava Zoo is a zoological garden founded in 1951, since September 2018 operating as Zoologická zahrada a botanický park Ostrava, which keeps over 4,000 animals on roughly 100 ha.
Ostrava Zoo is a zoological garden in Ostrava, founded in 1951. According to the zoo's website, it keeps more than 4,000 animals on roughly 100 ha. The grounds include a botanical park with 6 km of educational trails.[1]
Origins in Kunčičky
The beginnings of the zoo are linked to miners from the Zárubek and Alexander mines, who built the Hornický sad (Miners' Garden) in Ostrava-Kunčičky. The garden was created from 1948 on a six-hectare plot near the Alexander mine, with the public, including schoolchildren, taking part in the work as volunteer brigades. It served for recreation and had an open-air stage, a dance floor, a children's paddling pool and sandpit, two tennis courts and a volleyball and basketball court.[1]
On the initiative of Bohumil Vítek, it was decided in 1949 to set up a zoological garden in the park. The first residents included one roe buck, two roe does and five pheasants; peacocks soon arrived, and more birds followed once an aviary was completed.[1] The official date of the zoo's founding is taken to be 26 October 1951, when its first founding charter was approved. In 1952 the zoo had six employees, and in 1953 Bohumil Vítek was put in charge of the newly established garden.[1]
The zoo struggled with the problems of the post-war period, above all a shortage of building material, which often came from demolitions. The zoo's administration was housed in a room measuring 3 × 5 m directly in the stables. There were also difficulties with feed, such as sunflower, millet or bird seed, and the zoo in Bratislava helped several times in obtaining it. According to documents, in 1955 the zoo had only a small refrigerator for meat, of which the monthly consumption was then 600 kg.[1]
The male Indian elephant Pepík, which the zoo acquired in 1956 from Prague Zoo, had been brought to Czechoslovakia as an eight-month-old calf, a gift from the Vietnamese government. Pepík lived through the wooden quarters in Kunčičky and the new elephant pavilion of 1962 in Stromovka, and died in 1964 after falling into a ditch.[1]
Move to Stromovka
A new site was already being sought when the zoo was founded in Kunčičky. Besides the Velký ostravský les, that is Stromovka in Slezská Ostrava, the Bělský les in the south of the city, Radvanice and Vřesina were considered. According to the zoo, Stromovka was favoured by its varied terrain, diverse forest cover and plentiful surface water. Construction of the new garden began in 1956.[1] In February 1960 the animals were moved from Kunčičky into provisional wooden structures and cages that had been transported from Kunčičky.[1]
Development of the grounds
With the support of the statutory city of Ostrava, the zoo gained new pavilions, large natural enclosures and walk-through exhibits. According to the zoo, the new facilities meet international criteria for keeping animals in human care, and the keepers support the natural needs of the animals, among other things by minimal intervention in the rearing of young.[2]
In 2013 the Saola restaurant was opened, operating year-round, with a classroom and outdoor play features on a water theme. In 2014 a safari began operating on an area of roughly six hectares with three enclosures through which a safari express travels. It is home to more than 100 representatives of African and Asian fauna, for example onagers, domestic water buffalo and Turkmenian markhors.[2]
The waterfowl pavilion was rebuilt as the Evolution Pavilion, which presents evolution through the example of life in West Africa. It houses more than 200 animals, among them western chimpanzees and Diana monkeys. According to the zoo, it was the most demanding project realised so far.[2] In 2015 a new entrance area was opened with ticket offices, a souvenir shop, toilets and facilities for the zoo's management. In the lower part one of the ponds was desilted and enlarged, creating the Continental Islands exhibit with Vietnamese sika deer and Siberian cranes, and on two small islands the walk-through Lemur Paradise exhibit, where visitors can enter among the lemurs in summer.[2]
Smaller exhibits include, for example, the walk-through Papua Aviary, Night Tanganyika with a reversed light regime, aviaries for eagles and owls, an enclosure for spur-thighed tortoises, and the Tsavo exhibit for dwarf mongooses and Cape porcupines. In 2019 construction began on two exhibits for endangered primates, white-cheeked gibbons and lion-tailed macaques. After the Evolution Pavilion, this is the second largest construction in the zoo's history.[2]
Botanical park
In September 2018 the zoo was renamed Zoologická zahrada a botanický park Ostrava (Zoological Garden and Botanical Park Ostrava). According to the operator, its botanical focus was predetermined by its location in the Velký ostravský les, whose botanical value was confirmed by research in 2003. Besides three botanical trails, a Rhododendron Park was opened, which according to the zoo is among the largest collections of rhododendrons and azaleas in Europe, together with an exhibit called Garden Art of the Far East with bonsai and ornamental trees.[2]