artificial tree – Koda Creative

London Sealife Aquarium Rainforest Adventure

Koda Creative were contracted by Aquarium Technology Ltd to provide the theming for a recent area refurbishment in London Sealife Aquarium.

We provided some trees and rockwork in the new Rainforest Adventure.

Here are some pictures of progress in the Cuban crocodile (Crocodylus rhombifer) habitat. In here we built some imitation kapok (Ceiba pentandra) trees. We also modified the original theming to create easy water access for the crocodiles and provided raised basking areas.

Check out a similar project we did in Bristol Zoo.

Trees for orangutans

Koda Creative was invited to join the multi skilled team at Houthoff Zoo Design to help build twelve giant trees in the new Orangutan Forest exhibit at Dublin Zoo.

The trees are copies of the kapok and banyan trees found in the Bornean orangutan’s natural habitat, the tropical rainforests of Borneo. Each tree is made from steel and concrete and the details are hand sculpted and painted. Three trees contain feeding systems which encourage the apes to climb high in search of treats. The tallest tree is 12m high and all offer climbing opportunities for these mainly arboreal animals. Some trees are connected by cables which the orangs can traverse across high above the heads of the humans below.

In the wild, these animals are losing their homes because of deforestation due to palm oil cultivation. Dublin Zoo hopes The Orangutan Forest enclosure will help highlight their plight and raise money for the Orangutan Foundation.

There is some more information about this exciting new exhibit on the Dublin Zoo website.

Read an article about the project on the Irish Independent newspaper here.

Spectacular drone footage on Dublin Zoo Facebook page here.

artificial tree in zoo exhibit — Two imitation kapok trees.

Kea habitat designs #1

I am working on the habitat design for a new kea Nestor notabilis exhibit. Here is the first draft model of one of the areas.

In the model, the zoo keeper is about to hide some food treats into that tree. The tree is a replica of a wind blown specimen which you might find high up in New Zealand’s South Island Alps. It will be made from steel and shotcrete and have epoxy lined holes into which the treats can be inserted. I have just realised the zoo keeper may have a few problems getting up there so we may have to add some steps into that fake rock or put a stainless steel ladder there.

Also in this habitat, there is a stream, waterfall and pool so the keas can bathe, cool off and wash their food in. The water will be on a closed system kept clean by mechanical, bio and U.V. filtration.

Find out more about keas here via the Kea Conservation Trust of New Zealand

Amazon waterfalls

The image below is a photo of a small waterfall we made in an amazon themed aviary. The trees to the left are 7m high supports for the stainless steel mesh structure and inspired by buttress trees Ceiba pentandra. The buttress trees and rockwork are made from steel, concrete and shotcrete. The brief for this project was to imagine what a small Amazon Rain Forest tributary waterfall might look like.

Artificial waterfall in amazon aviary — Amazon aviary waterfall

To make this artificial environment, we searched on Flickr for ‘amazon waterfalls’ and the following images are amongst what we used for artistic reference. I wanted to post these pictures to show part of the process we use when researching a zoo enclosure project. I hope you think we faithfully reproduced our little imaginary part of the Amazon Rain Forest.

To recap, the image above is fake and the ones below are real.

White Faced Sakis enjoy their new trees

We were very happy to see the white faced sakis, golden lion tamarins and pygmy marmosets using the trees we had made a few months previously. It was also good to hear that the enclosure is working as it should and now needs less keeper maintenance.

I managed to take these pictures on a sunny Sunday afternoon when we were taking a break from building the sloth tree. The weather had been so nice in Finland during this visit that the animals were spending a lot of the time enjoying the outdoor part of their enclosure. I got lucky with these ones.

I wrote about the building of these trees in a previous post.

Helsinki zoo made a small video of the animals during their first explorations (scroll to bottom of page to see this)

male white faced saki — Male white faced saki

Golden lion tamarin moving up in the world