Ouwehands Dierenpark is a zoo in Rhenen, in the Dutch province of Utrecht, set on a wooded rise called the Laarschenberg at the edge of the Utrecht Hill Ridge. It traces its roots to 1919, when Cor Ouwehand started a small farm on the Grebbeberg and began keeping a handful of animals alongside his chickens. Public curiosity about the raccoons, peafowl, and pheasants grew faster than the farm business itself, and when the Great Depression hit in the early 1930s, Ouwehand leaned into that interest, officially opening his zoo to the public on 18 June 1932.
Today the park covers about 22 hectares (54 acres) and draws roughly a million visitors a year, making it one of the larger zoos in the Netherlands. It survived a dark chapter during the 1940 Battle of the Grebbeberg, when authorities ordered dangerous animals destroyed for public safety, and the zoo wasn’t compensated for those losses until 1953. Since businessman Marcel Boekhoorn bought the park in 2000, its grounds have more than doubled, and it has built a reputation around one of Europe’s relatively few giant panda exhibits.
Stats at a Glance
- Location: Rhenen, Utrecht, Netherlands
- Opened: June 18, 1932
- Size: About 22 hectares (54 acres)
- Species: Around 130 species
- Annual visitors: About 1 million
- Famous for: Giant pandas Wu Wen and Xing Ya
What to See at the Park
The zoo’s headline residents are giant pandas Wu Wen and Xing Ya, who arrived from Chengdu, China, on loan in April 2017 and quickly became the park’s biggest draw, even producing cubs born on site in the years since. Beyond the pandas, Ouwehands Dierenpark is home to white lions (kept since 2001), African elephants, orangutans, gorillas, sea lions, and Humboldt penguins, spread across enclosures designed to let visitors get close to the animals. RavotAapia, the park’s large indoor play jungle, gives families an option to keep exploring even in poor weather.
A Zoo Shaped by History
Few Dutch attractions carry as direct a link to World War II as Ouwehands Dierenpark. During the Battle of the Grebbeberg in May 1940, with fighting raging nearby, authorities decided the zoo’s dangerous animals had to be destroyed, and founder Cor Ouwehand himself carried out the order. The zoo did not receive official compensation for those losses until 1953. Ouwehand died in 1950, and the park passed to his son Bram and son-in-law Jo Baars, who kept it running through the postwar decades before its later expansion under new ownership.
Explore more: Explore more zoos and aquariums.
Ouwehands Dierenpark FAQs
When did Ouwehands Dierenpark open?
The zoo officially opened on June 18, 1932, after founder Cor Ouwehand grew a small animal collection on his farm into a full public zoo.
Why is Ouwehands Dierenpark famous?
It’s best known for its giant pandas, Wu Wen and Xing Ya, which arrived on loan from China in 2017 and are among a small number of pandas kept at European zoos.
How big is Ouwehands Dierenpark?
The park covers about 22 hectares (54 acres) in Rhenen, in the Dutch province of Utrecht, and welcomes roughly a million visitors each year.
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Photo: Original uploader was Robert 1990 at nl.wikipedia (Original text : Ikzelf) / CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.