Environmental Engineering Reference
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Jackson, 2002: 44-51). These exchanges were by no means unequal; indeed the
Earl's personal zoo was decidedly superior. At his death it covered more than 100
acres and included 318 species of birds (1272 individuals) and 94 species of
mammals (345 individuals) (Fisher, 2002: 85-86). Among its denizens were bison,
kangaroos, zebras, lemurs, numbats, and llamas, as well as many species of deer,
antelope, and sheep. In addition to providing his animals with food, lodging, and
expert veterinary attention (sometimes from the most distinguished human
specialists), Derby had them immortalized by celebrated artists (including Edward
Lear) when they were alive, and by expert taxidermists afterwards. But he made
no plans for his menagerie, or even for any of the breeding groups it contained, to
survive him. His heir, already an important politician and soon to be prime
minister, had no interest in the animals and sold them at auction as soon as possible.
Late in the century, the eleventh Duke of Bedford, also a long-serving President
of the Zoological Society of London (1899-1936), established a menagerie at
Woburn Abbey, his Bedfordshire estate. By this time, the rationale for accumu-
lating such a vast private collection of living animals had evolved. The Woburn
park contained only ungulates (and a few other grazers, like kangaroos and
wallabies): its residents included various deer, goats, cattle, gazelles, antelope, tapirs,
giraffes, sheep, zebras, llamas, and asses. A summary census printed in 1905 made
it clear that, unlike his distinguished predecessor, the Duke collected with a view
to acclimatization. 'Only those animals believed to be hardy' were selected for trial,
and animals that were not 'good specimens', either because of their savage disposi-
tions or because their constitutions were not well adapted to the environment of
an English park, did not survive long (Anon, 1905).
That is to say, he collected with a view to the future, hoping that his park would
serve as a way station for species that might find new homes in Britain, whether in
stockyards or on public or private display. In several cases, Woburn Abbey in fact
provided a refuge—or even the last refuge—for remnant populations. Before the
Boxer Rebellion, the Duke secured a small herd of Père David's deer, a species
otherwise exclusively maintained in the imperial parks of China (and so already
extinct in the wild). An original herd of 18 had grown to 67 by 1913 (Chalmers
Mitchell, 1913: 79). Since their Chinese relatives fell victim to political turmoil,
all the current members of the species descend from the Woburn herd. He also
nurtured the Przewalski's horse—a rare wild relative of domesticated horses and
ponies, discovered (at least by European science) only in the late nineteenth
century, when it was on the verge of extinction (R. L., 1901: 103).
The Duke's emphasis on preservation also echoed a shift that was to become
increasingly evident in the rhetoric of zoological gardens in the course of the
twentieth century. As zoo-goers will have noticed, preservation, both of individual
animals and of threatened species, has loomed increasingly large in their publicity,
though, of course, intention is often one thing, and results are another. Less
predictive of the evolution of zoo policies was the Duke's emphasis on acclimat-
ization. His menageries contained mostly ungulates because those are the animals
that people like to eat. Although there have been occasional deviations, such as the
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