2024-03-22 16:50:29
On Saturday, March 23, the Prague Zoo opens to the public the new Gobi exhibit for Převalský’s horses and other Southeast Asian animals. It cost sixty million crowns, and thanks to it, people will see the last wild horses in the zoo area, not only in the Maiden’s Castle. In addition to them, visitors can find manula beasts, eared hedgehogs or even the Tatar boa constrictor, which is a prototype of the mythical worm Olgoi chorchoi.
Převalský’s horse disappeared from nature at the end of the 1960s, but there was a steadily growing population under human care, which allowed the species to return first to China and then to Mongolia. The Prague Zoo also participated in nine transports of Převalský’s horses to western Mongolia between 2011 and 2019. The Prague Zoo has so far transported 38 horses to Mongolia in the Return of Wild Horses project.
The new exhibition is located in the space between the upper station of the cable car and the Obora refreshment area, where the garden already had a paddock with horses in the past. “The stables were at the end of their useful life, as was the water reservoir that is here, so we had to repair it,” said zoo director Miroslav Bobek. The garden paid about 60 million crowns for the new exhibition, including the repair of the reservoir located in the space.
The new Gobi exhibition and pavilion at the Prague Zoo. | Photo: Jakub Plíhal
In the paddock, visitors will see four horses, three mares and one stallion. “In addition to the fact that Převalský’s horses are here, we adapted the paddock and the buildings so that the area resembles what it looks like in the Dzungar Gobi in Mongolia, where we have been returning the horses for a long time,” said Bobek.
In the exhibition, people will also find a number of elements that are meant to illustrate the Mongolian environment, for example a Mongolian yurt, a stone with petroglyphs or the so-called ovó, which is a Mongolian mound made of stones. According to Bobek, the garden also built a replica of Flaming Cliffs, which is an important paleontological site, where visitors can see, for example, an imitation of oviraptor eggs.
Eared hedgehog and Tatar boa constrictor
In addition to Převalský’s horses, there are aviaries with manula felines or a pavilion with small mammals, reptiles and invertebrates, where visitors can see, for example, a long-eared hedgehog, a Mongolian gerbil or a Tatar boa constrictor, which is a prototype of the mythical worm Olgoi chorchoi.
Převalský’s horse is the last surviving wild species of horse. The Prague Zoo has been breeding them since 1932 and has been keeping an international stud book since 1959. Over 230 foals were born in the zoo and in its breeding and acclimatization station in Dolní Dobřejov. The Prague Zoo received the highest WAZA Conservation Award from the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums for the Return of Wild Horses project and for its long-term contribution to saving the Převalský horse.