Black Swan + Koi Exhibit

July 31st, 2014.

Does this "enclosure" end at the back of the pond or continue into the grassy yard behind it? Also what's in the tiny corncrib to the left?

~Thylo

@ThylacineAlive The enclosure for the two swans ends at the back of the pond and it must be the smallest waterfowl exhibit I've seen in my life. Also, if I'm not mistaken, the corn crib cage on the left can be seen in all its ugly glory in this photo (actually two cages):

@snowleopard One wonders why they don't just give the terrestrial animals access to the whole grassy yard.

I can't believe this zoo has received Rhinoceros Hornbill, Buff-Cheeked Gibbon, and Gerenuk from LA in recent years.

~Thylo

@ThylacineAlive That's an interesting lineup of species! Hemker Park is a family-run zoo that has a great selection of hoofstock (in rather boring enclosures), but there is also crap like this at the zoo:

@snowleopard Indeed, I've heard a lot about this zoo in the past months. They're apparently an AZA-approved facility for sending surplus stock, too, which is just fancy wording for them being a zoo that gets first dips on whatever animals the AZA doesn't need anymore and wishes to dump somewhere else. Most of their impressive hoofstock collection (which appears to consist of mainly single individuals or pairs) results from individual SSP animals no longer being needed in the program. At least some of their Bighorn Sheep herd comes from LA as well.

I've not been to many roadside zoos, but the ones I have also have a bizarre mix of adequate to genuinely good enclosure and atrocities as seen above. One such example is Space Farms having a large, excellent Syrian Brown Bear enclosure featuring natural vegetation including trees as well as a small rocky hill, and then keep multiple Kodiak Bears in a tiny iron bar and concrete cage barely larger than the bears themselves. As for Hemker, it's a shame they have features as nice as that large covered waterfowl aviary and then choose to keep penguins (a single penguin?) in a tiny glass box with no outdoor pool.

~Thylo

Almost all of the old corn-crib cages have been demolished of repurposed for more suitable inhabitants. Hemker Park has really improved quite considerably within the last few years, and hopefully will continue to improve as the years go by.
There are still some pretty terrible exhibits, like the indoor waterfowl exhibit, the penguin exhibit, and the last corn-crib cage (now home to five vervets & two crested porcupines) among others.
But overall, I think Hemker is going in the right direction, and hopefully can fix some of the bad exhibits still lying around.

@Dhole dude what's in place of the cages shown above now?

~Thylo

@ThylacineAlive the Mara/Porcupine cages are no more, and have been replaced by the indoor Rhino barn. Sadly, the Spider Monkey Cage is still around, but now has a couple more ropes & natural substrate, now holding five Vervet’s & two African Crested Porcupines (as stated above). Fortunately it’s apparently next to go.