Thursday, November 4, 2010

Unknown Zoo

Perhaps Bjorn, Rob, or Thomas could translate for us, what, where and when these photos were taken. Is Tilburg's the name of the zoo, or the name of the company that took the photograph's?

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Tilburg is a city in Holland.
There is written:
11 photos as memory of the Tilburg Nature park.


Thomas

Wade G. Burck said...

Thomas,
Thank you. Do you know if the Tilburg Nature Park is still in existence, and whether it was a privately owned zoo or a municipal zoo? Also, how many lions and how many tigers did they have? How much meat did they eat each day? How old were they? How many male's were there, and how many female's did they have. Did they have any babies? How many, and what were the babies names? Did the lion's stay outside for half a day, or for the whole day?
Wade

Anonymous said...

Wade,

I know they had 9 elephants: Raja, Quinba, Tessa, Sona,
Sonja, Bonza, Louise, Aida and Isa. Raja is still alive and lives in Mallorca. Al the others are dead. The park existed from 1932 until 1973. First it called Burgers Dierenpark (= Burgers Animal Park) later they changed the name to Tilburgs nature and animal park. I know they had a lion called Leo witch they could touch !
It was a very important zoo for Netherland with a lot of animals !

Regards,
Thomas

Wade G. Burck said...

Thomas,
Good information. I have heard of Burgers Animal Park, but I did not know that Tilberg and Burgers were the same place. Do you know why it closed down?
Wade

Anonymous said...

Burgers is not a city but a family name. The Burgers Zoo still exists in Arnhem. The Burger family owned already the zoo in Arnhem and wanted to make a smaller zoo in Tilburg. They opened this one in 1932 and called it also Burgers Zoo. They sold it later to family Van Dijk and they called it Tilburg Nature and Animal park. The family "van dijk" had originally a company that did import and export of exotic animals ! In 1973 the "Van Dijk" family sold the park and this became the end of the park !

Thomas

Wade G. Burck said...

Thomas,
Thank you, you really educated me today. Many smaller zoo's got their start, or were at one time owned by an animal dealer importer/exporter. Much like the Fuggar banking house which set up gardens at Antwerp next to it's office in the early 1600's, where they set up cages to keep animals temporarily before selling them to collectors across Europe. The Dutch East India Company founded in 1602 built special buildings and stables in Antwerp to hold animals. Dutch sea captain's used to bring animals back from a voyage, and set cages up on the docks, and charge admission for people to look at the animals. A Dutch ship and crew brought the first Cassowary to Europe. It was unloaded in Amsterdam in 1597.
Wade

Rob said...

Tilburgs Zoo was owned by the family of the animal dealer v Dijk from 1946 till 1974.When the park closed.The collection therefore never was the same,because a lot of the animals moved to other zoo's ,etc.I visited the park almost every year ,till it sadly closed,when I was camping with my parents as a kid in a nearby village.Nice to see these pics of a childhood memory.I remember they once had a "white"elephant.

Rob.

Wade G. Burck said...

Rob,
Nice memories, thank you. Camping with you parent's is a pleasure that very few children get to experience today.
Do you recall if the feline exhibits were attached to buildings or were they rock work, with dens inside of them?
Wade

Rob said...

Wade ,as I recall the feline exhibits had the dens within them.
I also remember 2 polar bear cubs
in a small aviarylike cage ,without a pond,in midsummer,while there was a waterfilled ditch in front of the cages.Me splashing them with the water from the ditch ,that they eagerly took and enjoyed.But that was the problem with that zoo.The week after,there could be monkeys in this cage and the polar bears gone.

Rob.