Personally, I think ZSL produces one of the best UK guides. It's full of information about the animals, the history of the zoo, the exhibits, conservation work etc. It even includes info about some individual animals (names etc). Chester's also used to be good (small book packed with information) but they stopped producing them 3 years ago.
South Lakes Wild Animal Park produces one of the best zoo guides inthe U.K,some other good ones from the U.K are Newquay,Thrigby Hall and Marwell.The best guide i`ve got is the one to the Aquarium at Madrid Zoo closely followed by Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan.
The best zoo-guide of The Netherlands is that of Artis (Amsterdam Zoo). This zoo has a very long tradition of making guides. This started with a sort of guide in 1842, which was a book with interesting information about some animals living at the zoo, with beautiful pictures. I'm very proud to own a copy of it. The modern guides are higly informative with a lot of history of the oldest zoo of The Netherlands (founded in 1838), and lots of photos.
Funny, before i read your response i thought "Artis!". Guess i'm not the only one thinking that then I think it's just the right size, enough information without becoming too big to read... The one i have of ZSL also comes pretty close and the Berlin Zoo one is also really thick (almost too thick) but very informative.
Marwell is very good but lacks in explaining the exhibits! london zoo or amazon world are the best ones
My pick of Zoo Guide book not that I have seen that many ..... but I have a copy of Berlins zoo guidebook , and I am impressed with that as well --- very informative without being overly scientific .
Which is the best Guidebook ? Hard to say, because guidebooks are so diffrent... The Berlin Zoo Guidebooks are not bad, but the new ones are always the same guide with diffrent covers. The current guidebook, published 2007, looks nice, but its very bad, becuase to many species are missing, a lot of species has two ore more pages, it contains a lot of mistakes...Its not a good guidebook. This year, the new director of the Zoo will publish a new one, I'm curious if this guidebook will be better. The Leipzig Zoo has a very good guidebook,they publish it in english, too. And I like the Munich Guidebook. Both guidebooks are easy to handle during the visit(but which common zoo visitor is doing that ? ), the have very good picture sand maps and they are very informative. I like the japanese guidebooks, most of them are pretty cool. I love the current guidebook of the Okinawa churaumi aquarium with the whale sharks on the cover. Its very thick and ha sbrillant pictures, unfortunately, its in japanese, but a pictures says more than thousands words... The Guidebooks of San Diego Zoo are great, I hope, to get the 2007 edition as soon as possible...
Do anybody has a guidebook of the Georgia Aquarium ? I know, there is a 2005 edition with a beluga whale on the cover. I think, the vistors get it free and throw it after the visit in a basket, they do the same at the Dallas World Aquarium... How thick is the guidebooks and has it good pictures ? Next year, I will visit the Georgia Aquarium, I can't await it to see the whale sharks...
Georgia Aquarium's guidebook is small in comparison to most current guidebooks. However it maps out each gallery and mentions the highlights. The book costs $1 or $5? cant remember...and can be obtained at the information desk inside the main hall of the aquarium. I had to ask around for it, because they didnt (as of Spring 2006) sell it in the giftshop.
I will get this guidebook in a few weeks, I've ask for it by e-mail to the Aquarium when i orderd the Book"Bringing the ocean to Atlanta", and the ytold me, the guidebook is free, so I ask ,if I can get 5 copies for exchange, and they told me"No Problem". They sned the stuff to girl friend of mine in Dallas, she collects all the stuff, whcih I've bought at ebay and send it it to me from time to time, so I have to wait for the guidebook a few weeks.Maybe they gave it for free, because they publish a new edition ? The Tierpark Berlin has every year a new edition and shortly before the new book come out, the sell the last year edition cheaper. I had the same problem like you, when I've visted Prague Zoo in 2007. I knew, they had a 2006 edition guidebook, but they don't sell it at the entrance or in the giftshopes, but only at one tiny kiosk, where you can buy some drinks and food..I was running through the whole zoo to get the guidebook. I don't know why they didn't sell it at the entrance or in the shops.
Port Lympne or Howletts is Packed with info about the Animals, & Marwells was good as well, but in 2006 they stopped producing those ones, shame relly.
@Cat-man. Maybe Marwell will publish a new guidebook this year or next year. Most german zoos only publish a new guidebook after the formely edition is sold out. Only a few zoos publish every year a new edition, so both Zoos in Berlin,Stuttgart or Hannover. Unfortunately some big german zoos has stopped producing guidebooks, so Cologne, Magdeburg and Hagenbeck, because visitors didn't buy them. I don't think thats true, maybe its to expensive for that zoos to produce a guidebook. A lot of german zoos sell the guidebooks with a big success and some zoos make a little profit with them. The reason is, they have mostly the visitors favourite animals on the cover, tigers, apes, monkeys,lions, elephants, hippos or ,of course, polar bears. Thats very boring for collectors, I have only a few guidebooks with antelopes on the cover. Halle has a green iguana on the cover of the 2008 guidebook.
I bet the internet has had an affect on guidebook sales. For zoos with decent websites, most, if not all, the information in a guidebook can usually be found there instead. Quite often the zoos just supply a map at the entrance these days. The pricing of guidebooks seems to vary wildly. On my zoo trips last summer, they ranged from the cheap (£2.00 at Cotswold Wildlife Park) to the extortionate (Edinburgh's - can't remember the exact price but it was around £6 or £7. Suffice to say I didn't open my wallet )
Yes i have to say Marwell is not the best for updateing their guides very quickly they seem to keep them for a good ciple of years. also i find that sometimes the only things that change on some guides is just the front cover with maybe one or two pictures inside very annoying
Colchester give out a free map with details but also have boxes on the way out for visitors to put them in to have them re used. But I did buy one of there spiral bound species guides for £2.99 which I found very good, it also has photos of the actual animals in the zoo as well as a short right up on the species. ideal for kids to animal spot with!
