I've never been to Dublin Zoo nor have I ever been to Ireland; although, both are on my to do list (I could do with living about a 1000 years!). I always expected Dublin to be a big zoo, and in land area it may be so. However, today, I looked at its list of animals on Zootierliste. According to that source it only has 75 species. Is it really that small? As an aside I've noticed that Zootierliste don't seem to list that many amphibians, fish and invertebrates. Have I simply looked at the animal lists of zoos with few of these species or are they not usually featured on Zootierliste? I know Zootierliste is not an official database so that leaves me wondering how accurate it is.
Dublin Zoo is quite large in size, but is almost exclusively focused on the standard large mammals, with birds and other groups almost absent. Zootierliste is pretty accurate for Dublin, but it doesn't list invertebrates. I found Dublin a very dull zoo, everything looks attractive for an average visitor and enclosures are often spacious, but that is about it.
Thanks for confirming what Zootierlist says. I always expected it to have more animals and a greater diversity of species. It may stay on my to do list but it's gone very far down it towards the bottom.
I would agree with lintworms assessment and also Zootierliste is accurate but a little generous as a fair few listed reptiles are not on show and giraffe and chimps are listed twice as pure and generic but housed together. It pains me to say there are only about 40 different kinds of mammal and bird usually viewable, including a few singles. The reptile house is clean with a dozen boxy aquariums with petshop type reptiles and a crocodile exhibit, the larger part of this house has model animals such as dinosaurs. The childrens farm is dull and during off season is almost devoid of animals. There is a newly built exhibit most years but they are often underwhelming and cost several million each. The catering is costly with little choice and bland. On the plus side it is a lovely flat site with great planting and two large lakes,and the animals they do have are often in large healthy groups/flocks/herds in spacious enclosures. Dublin zoo in a normal year gets about fives times the visitor numbers that the much more diverse and species rich Belfast would. They have a great relationship with the media and their marketing department won a best marketer in Ireland award recently. The history and prestige gives a huge marketing advantage and most Irish people with young families visit at least once a year. So if you come to Dublin it is well worth a visit and you may be pleasantly surprised, but most zoonerd types would be underwhelmed.
