Our first stop was a visit to
the koala bears - but it really doesn't matter when you visit them, since
they never seem to be active - except for actively sleeping, I suppose. :-)
They were doing a lot of work on the outdoor part of the koala bear
exhibit so none of them were outside. We wondered if maybe they are
turning part of it into an art exhibit, though, because we saw this
very interesting Glove Sculpture - note the
balance of the gloves and the symbolism of placing them at the end
of a pole...the raw emotion of sticking them in a pile of dirt...the artist
was truly inspired.
After oohing and ahing over the sculpture :-) we headed down the canyon
past all of the goat and sheep things to where they keep many of the small
mammals. This critter is a fossa, and we think he looks like a cross
between a dog, a cat, and a weasel. The eyes are especially strange
looking. We also saw a couple of Taryas (which are members of the weasel
family) and a beautiful Caracal. They were all fairly active at this
time of day.
At the
Panda Research Station, we saw the zoo's two Giant Pandas, Shi Shi and
Bai Yun. Shi Shi (pictured here) was enjoying the bamboo, but
Bai Yun was totally sacked out in the tree -
she could teach our cats a
thing or two about sleeping. :-)
We headed up to Hoof and Horn
Mesa, since that's where the polar bears were supposed to be - though
that seemed a rather strange location to us. Anyway, we saw a very strange,
very LARGE hoofed creature standing on his enclosure,
and finally saw a sign that told us it was a Mimshi Takin (pronounced
Tah-kin), which is found in China. Lee tried to take a photo, but it
didn't come out very well, so this photo is actually of a Giant Eland,
instead.
The Giant Eland is the largest of the antelopes, and can weigh over 2000 pounds. Antelope things aren't especially interesting to us (though the Takins were new and different), so we made a pretty quick pass through, still searching for the polar bears.
Then we finally found
Polar Bear Plunge, the polar bears' habitat. Three polar bears were
frolicking in the water - playing with a ball, breaching out of the
water, pushing themselves off of the glass - it was really quite an
entertaining show. The habitat is very nice - patterned after the
Arctic summer tundra.
In addition to a very large pool, the bears also have a
waterfall and rocks and logs to play on. We saw 4 polar bears in the
enclosure, and they were all very active. They're all pretty
young, though - less than 2 years old.
This polar bear was doing his impression of a hippo munching on greenery - we thought it was pretty funny.
Next we went over to
Hippo Beach. Sleeping underwater is a very strange concept, but the
two hippos were doing that - one was actually sleeping on top of the
other. They would raise their nostrils above the water every few
minutes to breathe.
We were happy to see that the water was very clear - we have been there
on other occasions when the pumps aren't working properly, and the
visibility is very poor. Since the hippos spend most of the time
underwater, it's hard to get a good look at them unless the water
is clear.
From Hippo Beach we went over to Sun Bear
Forest, and then headed over to the "Wild Ones" show. That's
one of my favorite things to see - we usually see different animals
every time, and they showcase the animals' natural behaviors rather
than tricks. This time we got to see a 10 month old badger that was
raised by a family - the family dog brought him home when he was about
two weeks old, and he slept in bed with them, even went to court with
the husband who was an attorney! But, as well-socialized as he is, the
family realized that those long claws and sharp teeth could cause
problems, and that they needed to find a better place for him.
We also saw a river otter, an emu, a red-tailed hawk, and, the best part as far as I was concerned, a clouded leopard. The leopard was just beautiful, though a lot smaller than I expected. He's 13, and a senior citizen these days, so he doesn't have to do too much more than just come out and make an appearance, but in his younger days he used to do 30 foot leaps across stage. Wow.
After the
show we saw a Brazilian Jaguar - who has black fur, but we could still
see his spotted pattern.
We visited the meerkats, but they were hiding away, and we only saw three of them.
On the way out we walked past the Spotted Quolls - the "tiger cat" of Australia. We finally got this picture of one - he wouldn't hold still for very long, and the digital camera isn't really that fast. Quolls really aren't related to cats, they are marsupials, but they look more like a cat than any of Australia's other animals.
We also got to see a Tasmanian
Devil. He wasn't nearly as fierce looking (or as energetic!) as Warner
Brothers cartoon version. :-) The zoo had added quite a few more
Australian animals since the last time we were there - they have had
the koalas and the Goodfellows tree kangaroos for a long time, but
this time we also saw the Quolls, the Tasmanian Devil, and some other
kangaroos and wallabies.
There was still a lot of things that we didn't see, like
Tiger River,
Gorilla Tropics, the Children's Zoo, etc., but we had had a nice
extended morning. One thing I haven't commented on...in addition to all of
the animal species, the zoo is home to thousands of
plant species,
too, many of them endangered as well.
It's a beautiful place just to walk around, even without seeing the
animals. Many plants are in bloom right now, including the azaleas
pictured here.
Text and photographs copyright © 1998, by Laura Gilbreath. Feel free to link to this document, but you may not redistribute it in any form without the express written consent of the copyright holder.
Laura Gilbreath, lgil@cts.com
