Tanja (walrus)
Tanja (* approx. 1974 ; † February 16, 2007 in Hanover ) was a female walrus ( Odobenus rosmarus ) that lived in the Hanover zoo and was one of the public favorites.
Life
Tanja was caught as a young animal in September 1974 off the Russian Wrangel Island in the Arctic Ocean . At that time there was hardly any experience of rearing walrus calves. On September 28, she arrived in Hanover with a weight of 98 kg, where she grew up with the second wild-caught young animal Boris (105 kg). Since walruses are breastfed for up to six months and stay with their mother for up to three years, both animals were raised on a special diet of filleted herring, whipped cream, milk powder, raw eggs, cod liver oil, salts and vitamins. At the beginning of 1975 her weight had already doubled and in adulthood the daily ration should be between 30 and 40 kg of fish. Although the walruses are said to have been very fond of one another and mate, the effort to achieve breeding success in a natural way was in vain.
The male animal Boris died of heart failure in 1999, while Tanja's state of health was rated as "quite good" despite the blindness and hearing loss that appeared in old age. One to two weeks before she died, the walrus began to lose appetite and withdrew into the water, which was attributed to pain and cramps. This was accompanied by apathy and severe weight loss, whereupon Tanja lost her weight from the usual 1000 kg to 576 kg. Since the animal's condition only improved for a short time despite the administration of medication, the zoo veterinarians decided to relieve the walrus from its suffering and to put it to sleep. “We will miss it”, the zoo director Klaus-Michael Machens later told the press. “Many of us had known Tanja since childhood.” The carcass was handed over to the pathology department of the University of Veterinary Medicine in Hanover for examination .
After her well-known conspecific Antje , who was about two years younger than her, died in the Hagenbeck Zoo in Hamburg , Tanja was the only walrus that lived in a German zoo until her death in 2007. Walruses did not return to Hamburg until 2012 and they soon had offspring.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c cf. Mourning for Tanja: The last walrus in the German zoo is dead , Agence France Presse - German, February 16, 2007, Hanover
- ^ Report on Tanja's death at Spiegel Online
- ↑ Germany's last walrus dies in Hanover , ddp-Basisdienst, February 16, 2007, 12:43 PM GMT
- ↑ cf. dpa-AFX overview: Miscellaneous, February 16, 2007, 7.15 p.m.
- ^ NDR: Hope for offspring in the walrus flat share. In: www.ndr.de. Retrieved January 10, 2017 .