ABSTRACT
Rotterdam Zoo began in a unique way, as a most private of private ventures. It has evolved into one of the finest zoos of modern Europe. There are two well-known zoos in The Netherlands, one in Amsterdam, the other in Rotterdam. The collection of animals in the Rotterdam Zoo, numbering at the end of 1977 just over 2,300 birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles of some 600 species, as well as about 600 fish, continues to reflect the Netherlands' interest in, and association with its former empire in south Asia. The Zoo's collection of hoofed animals also includes the rare okapi from central Africa, the gemsbok from southern Africa, and the pudu, a species of very small deer from South America. Rotterdam had the first group of orang-utans to breed regularly in a zoo. Beginning in 1949 when the first birth took place, there have already been twenty-four births.
