Just because a species is “filler” does not mean it is not essential or important (even if it’s moreso a group that’s essential rather than a particular species), those are not mutually exclusive. I feel like people have been using the term lately to brush off animals as unimportant or uninteresting, but filler species are just as important as star animals, make up the bulk of zoo collections, and are among the most common zoo animals as a whole, it’s very difficult to build a realistic park without a diverse selection of them. Imagine if we only had giraffes and zebra for our African hoofstock sections, but small-medium antelope were left out because they were “boring filler”, or if we had nothing for our reptile houses beyond crocodilians, komodos, and giant tortoises. That's what the game's bird roster feels like.
The musk ox is not essential in the slightest and might be the most overrated community favorite there is. It’s a very cool animal and I can see why people want it, but calling it essential is a massive stretch.
Going off of that, neither are the secretary bird or shoebill (I’d love both, don’t get me wrong, but with how few birds we get they just aren’t a priority), and that's coming from someone who adores shoebills irl (they're so stinking cute). The helmeted guineafowl, grey crowned crane, ground hornbill, great white pelican, and an African waterfowl species are all birds from Africa alone that I'd find more useful than them even if I wouldn't consider all of them essentials.
As someone who builds lots of NA zoos… I can live without the ABB. Don’t get me wrong, I’d still like it - it’s an insanely common animal and one of my favorite bear species - but my zoos don’t really feel like they’re missing much without it. We have plenty of star animals for the region to choose from already and my zoos feel far more empty without any bird to sprinkle into my native wildlife sections. I’d rather have us get at least two picks between a landfowl, waterfowl, and wader before any mammal for the region. We also don’t need another deer species for that matter.
The rhea was more essential than the spectacled bear and it’s not even close.
If animal packs keep going the way they are, then I kind of miss scenery packs as our last two were far better than any of the recent animal packs, (though Barnyard has grown on me quite a bit even if its breed choices were lackluster). I’d love Frontier to prove me wrong and give us another pack on the level of Grasslands, Wetlands, or NA though (please…)
Even as someone who doesn’t build in Europe, the region is prime for widespread, temperate bird species and it’s a crime that all we have is the mute swan (and it took us a while to even get that). I’d hope for a white stork (364 holdings in the EU alone btw lol, that's a whole lotta bird) at least one other waterfowl species, and of course the pelican.
The only essential ungulates left beyond the blackbuck and muntjac (or other similar species that fill the same niche) are all domestics. Sorry, but I think a kunekune, dwarf goat, ankole-watusi, etc. are far more valuable additions to the roster than more African antelope, another camelid, or another medium-large deer species. If Frontier continues to sprinkle random ungulates into packs, I’d rather they slowly expand upon the lacking domestic roster than continue to build upon groups/regions that are already rich with them. There are some other wild ones that could be decent additions (mostly from South America and Asia), but I wouldn’t go as far to call them essential.
