Zoo Mariánské Lázně

Little known, yet significant zoo with a short but interesting existence. It was located in the village of Vlkovice near Marienbad on Klinger hill. Julian Kriesel (allegedly Pole from Děčín) partly purchased and partly rented 8 ha of land, left to develop a project for zoo and 7th June 1931 officially opened that. A log cabin "Old Shatterhand" in the Wild West styple, which served as a restaurant and bar was the centre of the zoo. Another restaurant and lookout tower stood next. The animals were in enclosures and cages and also roamed freely. Little bear (rather coati), badgers, raccoons, mongooses, macaques, blackbucks, hartbeests, fallow and roe deer, llamas, ponies, muskrat, dormouses, maras, rheas, emus, eagles, hawsk, eagle owls, little owls, cranes , storks, parrots, jackdaws, doves, several species of pheasants, guinea fowl, peacocks...

Kriesel was arrested in 1940s and the zoo nationalized after the war. In the summer of 1951, it burned down and was never rebuilt.