Giraffes and sealions prepare to farewell Adelaide Zoo as impressive new resident sizes up new lair
Adelaide Zoo staff are about to say goodbye to three beloved residents but an awe-inspiring new specimen is on its way.
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Adelaide Zoo’s last remaining giraffe and two sea lions are on the move in the hope of finding a more comfortable lifestyle interstate.
Kimya the giraffe will move to the new Sydney Zoo by the end of the year, while sea lions Ady and Tasko are preparing to head to the east coast. The sea lions’ new home is yet to be confirmed.
But it’s not all one-way traffic, with Adelaide Zoo set to welcome South Australia’s first Komodo dragon by the end of this year.
There are also plans to secure a leopard within three years.
Adelaide Zoo director of life sciences Dr Phil Ainsley said Kimya would have 10 times more space at Sydney Zoo, but getting her there was a challenge.
“How do we move a 1.2 tonne animal, 5m in height in a trailer? It's a big logistic move,” he said.
In January this year, Dr Ainsley announced plans to move Kimya and her half-sister Dharba by the middle of this year.
But setbacks, including the tragic death of Dharba, delayed the relocation.
Staff at the zoo have been training Kimya for six months to get her comfortable in the trailer that will transport her to Sydney.
“Kimya is a timid giraffe at the extreme end,” Dr Ainsley said.
“This (moving her to the trailer) has taken a lot longer than we’d hoped, but we have to keep in mind that it’s her personality.”
Dr Ainsley said Zoos SA would continue to house giraffes at Monarto Safari Park.
More than 35,000 people signed a petition in 2018 calling on the zoo to move the sea lions to a larger enclosure.
“In the last three months we’ve been working with another facility in the east coast, unfortunately at the moment I can’t say who that is,” Dr Ainsley said.
He was confident the sea lions would be moved in the first quarter of 2020.
The Komodo dragon will be kept in Adelaide Zoo’s reptile house when it first arrives from Prague Zoo.
But the zoo is working on plans to build a new South East Asia precinct within the next three years for the Komodo dragon and hopefully a leopard.
“Once we have that area we would look at being part of the original breeding program (for Komodo dragons),” Dr Ainsley said.
