The Oregon daily journal., September 01, 1907, Page 36, Image 36

!-&tiie Oregon su::day journal, potland,. Sunday horning, czptemcer ;t,
1907
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TT7 HO attt felt Half 'disappoint
'' iy t menh-or morn than half
, froni observing that zoological
park animals are either caged or held with
in high-fenced bounds-constant reminderi
of their captivity t
Who hastt wondered how it would
look to see these same beasts on their na
tive heathf wish trees and water and wild
environments,' the warm greensward under
foot?
Whether their eyes would take on thai
ferce sparkle we read of in nature stories f
Whether' their limbs would contract with
amazing -suppleness instead of that lazy
stretching T Whether those catlike purr
ings would give place to real blood-curd-ling
yellst '
'At last the careless zoo has come. rAb
tolutely free 40 far as visitors can observe
to mingle together as in the jungles, sur
rounded by natural scenery and exhibiting
ull the characteristics and appearances of
savagery in this startling manner do the
600 animals of Carl Hagehbeck's zoo at
Hamburg, Germany, live.
Ana it is no toy zoo, either, but in size
and in number. and variety of animals is the
most important in the world.
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FEW things are more ptthetlo than the
sight of a powerful Eon or tiger stretch
edlarily, dejectedly, on the board flooi
of a cage. The spectator sees the hu
miliation, the beast feels it
' ; To view a creature for the sake of studying
or admiring is one thing; it is quite another
thing to look at the creature with that, feeling
of conquest; ol triumph, instigated by seeing it
behind bars where It cannot, reach us a purely
brutal 1 'eeling. .
The first is laudable; the latter, demoraliz
ing. In most of the American zoos there has
been some attempt at supplying natural but
. Toundings f or the animals, such as the bear pits
and the seal ponds.
Here one always finds the most pleased
spectators. The idea of captivity is in a meas
ure hidden from the beast and the human vis
itors, and both are happier for it.
IN NATURAL SURROUNDINGS
If only the tigers, lions, wolves and snakes
: could be seen in that way I How it would aid
. the imagination how it would take one in re
ality to the jungle!
. -.. Americans know Hagenbeck as a great
animal collector and dealer. He owns as many
wild animals at a time as are found in most
of the large zooldgical parks.
.. The story of how he has sent expeditions to
: Africa and India to secure specimens of wild
beasts, of how he has nearly lost his life a dozen
- times in encounters with irate animals is mar
velous. .But ofliniimtely 'greater vafce to sci
ence is his new eooddea. . . ; 1. .
- Assisting for. .over half a. century in the
erection and equipping . 'of zoological parks, ie
became firmly convinced .that animals, must live
amid natural environments, not in cages, if 'they
are to become a 'source of pleasure', aid instruo-
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Gradually, he perfected a plan f or an ideal
too, went to work on a Ihirty-six-acre piece of
land at Stellingen, . a . suburb of Hamburg, and
now has it about complete. It already harbors
hundreds of beasts and birds, for as rapidly as
any 'part of the park has been, completed the
animals have been turned into it. v
Not a single iron bar not even a piece of
wire nettingis to be seen by the visitor 'be
tween himself and the most ferocious beasts in
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caves, wading in pools, or walking througn
groves, the jungle denizens, and imagine your
self not on quiet German soil, but in a far-away
savage country. '
Yes, and your hair absolutely stands on
edge, so realistic is the scene. These beasts ab
solutely unrestrained ! What moment may they
not , take, it into their heads to make a plunge
at you you may be only thirty feet from the
wildest of them1-and tear, you to pieces!
Remember, it is not only a few animals that
may possibly have been tamed not these alone
that you see here, but animals of all types and
conditions of savagery.
And they all commingle together just as
on their native heath. The only exception to
this is that certain families are kept apart not
by bars or nets, but by barriers in imitation of
nature, so ingeniously devised and constructed
as to never suggest their purpose.
ARTIFICIAL MOUNTAINS
For instance, a jagged mountain made of
sheet iron and stone and cement and paint, but
accurately imitating the real thing: separates
the lions and tigers from the section where roam
the camels, yaks, llamas, goats, sheep, cranes,
geese and other creatures.
All these things the t visitors seem to see
from as intimate a vantage point as though they
were mingling with the beasts.
Of course, they don't really mingle with!
them. They stay on a path which does not
enter the animals' domain, but which appears to
be part of it.
Along one side of the path is a fringe of
shrubbery, as high as one's chin. Looking over
this, one sees the animals. He sees no bar of
any kind between nothing but the hedge. But
there is a bar, though invisible.
There is a ditch thirty feet wide and fifteen
feet deep, half 'filled with water. No animal
could jump that distance without taking a run
ning start. And none can take a running start,
because the scenery is so arranged as to make
the distance too short.
But what if a tiger, say, should get down
into the ditcli could he not climb up the other
sjdet No, for that side is made so absolutely
perpendicular that no animal could climb it.
However, there are steps at intervals up which
animals that fall into the water may climb on
their own side. $a their. habitat. , .
JgpUR, SECTIONS OF THE GARDEN '
An interesting part of the zoo is the arti
ficial mountain section, where mountain goats
and deer are seen in their natural methods of .
life. There are eight imitation mountains, tow
ering from sixty to 150 feet into the air. So
. effective is this that one may see the ibex jump
from one steep to another.
- There are four 'sections to the gardens one
devoted to aquatic birds, 'one, to camels, drome
daries, ostriches, etc ; ' a thifd to lions, tigers
and big cats, and a fourth to goats and deer.
On the top of the- mountains are eagles,
vultures and such big birds, which appear to be "
' free,, but are in reality made captive by their
'chains,' invisible to the spectators (
!'; ; Constantly Mr. .Hagenbeck proposes to add
new ideas. Those upon ' which he is now work- ,
ing are an arctic, scene for the. polar bears and
a large basin for seals and sea .lions.
" There will also be a group of native villages
' ' : . populated by peope ifrop all parta of the world,
creation no even at the rear of the animal orAfAdd to this ff mountain for reindeer, a chil
at any side of it . . . . " w dren's playground and a lot, of elephants, camels
. You lookover a field of yegetation and 'see nl donkeys upon which, passengers may, ride,
, climbing'the rocky side of a" immature moun-' and you see that Mr, Hagenbeck wilUiava the
' tain' gamboling under the trees, lounging in ; modi interesting zoo in the world.
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