I recently made my way to Attleboro, Massachusetts, to visit the Capron Park Zoo and the WWI Memorial Park and Zoo. I already wrote about my experience at the WWI Memorial Park and Zoo, and if you would like to hear more about the place, you can read my review here. This thread contains my review of the Capron Park Zoo—a zoo which vastly outshines its competitor in the Attleboro area. Background The Capron Park Zoo is an 8-acre zoo in Attleboro, Massachusetts. The zoo opened in 1937 and is one of 6 Massachusetts zoological institutions to be currently accredited by the AZA. The zoo is set in Capron Park in a great community location, right by Attleboro’s farmer’s market, elementary school, and high school. The town must be an amazing place to live for young animal lovers-- I wish my old high school was within walking distance of a zoo back when I was younger! My visit was on a Saturday, which is Farmer’s Market Day, and so I arrived to see the park packed with food trucks, shoppers, and bustling groups of children, all engaging in the community event. The park felt really charming and quaint between the schools, the zoo, the farmer’s market, the nice fields, and the crowds of local community members having fun on a Saturday morning. I’d never been to Capron before, but the community felt so nice and endearing, and the park gave me a great feeling of childlike nostalgia. This sense of charm continued when I entered the zoo itself, as the facility has a lot of personality. The zoo has a sound system which plays light background music throughout the park, creating a nice ambient effect. The zoo has a lot of funny signage, including signs warning visitors about climbing on exhibit barriers because the “animals could eat you and that might make them sick”. The zoo has a unique “splash pad” structure (instead of a regular playground), and many local families would bring children in their bathing suits to play in the fountains of water. And as a small zoo catered to a more local population, Capron gives visitors the chance to get to know the animals well, fostering a greater sense of sentimentality and connection among their regular returning visitors. I’d seen some videos and images of Capron online before my visit, but none captured these wonderful aspects of the zoo’s (and park’s) charming atmosphere and personality. Foreground Having discussed the atmosphere and background of the Capron Park Zoo, I also wanted to touch more on the facility itself. The zoo is laid out in a round web of paths, with a good mix of outdoor and indoor exhibits. In fact, Capron has 3 main animal houses: the tropical house (which mostly contains tropical birds and was closed during my visit due to avian flu), the nocturnal house (which contains animals like fennec foxes and bush-tailed bettongs), and the Sadler building (which is a nonthematic building that houses animals like servals, De Brazza’s monkeys, bats, and meerkats). Strewn along the paths between these 3 buildings is an array of outdoor exhibits, including a habitat by the zoo entrance for North American river otters, a pair of lemur islands, some smaller exhibits for animals like red pandas and African spurred tortoises, and two grottoes for Sloth Bears and Lions. Zoo Map -credit to Capron Park Zoo website Some of Capron’s exhibits, like the otter and water monitor exhibits, seemed perfectly fine for their inhabitants. But I have to admit that I was pretty unimpressed with the habitats for many of the zoo’s large and/or tropical animals. The sloth bear and lion exhibits were both unnaturalistic and gave their animals way less space than I expected. The lemur islands were also small and had no trees or tall climbing structures, being vastly outshined by comparable exhibits like the capuchin islands at the Denver Zoo. The worst exhibit was for an amur leopard, who seemed to have roughly the same amount of space as the African spurred tortoise and red pandas. She spent almost my entire two-hour visit pacing back and forth. White Lion Exhibit, October 2017 by blospz posted 11 Oct 2017 at 4:46 PM Red Ruffed Lemur Exhibit by fkalltheway posted 2 Apr 2018 at 8:56 PM Amur Leopard Exhibit by blospz posted 11 Oct 2017 at 5:07 PM As I looked at Capron’s animals and exhibits, I thought a lot about how the zoo compares to the Stone Zoo—another small Massachusetts zoo which I am more familiar with. Capron has the advantage over Stone when it comes to ABC animals (Capron has African lions while Stone has mountain lions), but Stone has the clear advantage when it comes to exhibit naturalism. While both zoos have some exhibits that need work, Stone also has some incredible exhibits like Himalayan Highlands and their large wolf habitat. Many of Capron’s exhibits were perfectly fine for their animals, but unlike Stone, Capron had no single exhibit that really blew me away. Stone Zoo Mexican Grey Wolf Enclosure - Oct 2017 by Newzooboy posted 29 Oct 2017 at 6:10 PM Now, while many of Capron’s exhibits lack quality and immersion, I will acknowledge that some of the zoo’s animals appeared to be completely unbothered by this. I had never seen a white lion before this visit, and I really enjoyed my time at the habitat for the big cats. The lion pair was active in the morning, and I observed no stereotypic behavior from either of them in spite of their habitat’s small size. My favorite animal in the entire zoo was Vicky, the sloth bear. She was also really active, and spent her time foraging, climbing, and playing with her enrichment. When I first saw her, she was lazily lying on her back with food in her paws, slowly working away at it with her tongue. At one point she climbed all the way up her tower in search of more enrichment, and upon reaching the top, charismatically looked out from her perch onto the rest of the zoo, watching over. She was so cute, shaggy, and funny looking with her long fur, and was a complete joy to watch. Vicky the Sloth Bear by ZooElephantsMan posted 22 Aug 2022 at 5:37 PM The fact that Capron’s low exhibit quality did not generally have an inordinate impact on their animals’ quality of life can likely be owed to the zoo’s dedicated keeper staff, who must put a lot of effort into giving their animals the attention and enrichment they need and deserve. In the future, the zoo should still obviously invest in higher quality habitats for their animals. But in the meantime, Capron seems to be doing a nice job making do with what they are given. And as a lifelong visitor to the underfunded Franklin Park Zoo, this was something I could really sympathize with. Capron did have some other smaller issues, in addition to their exhibit quality. Capron has a pretty unorganized layout, with multiple exhibits grouped together with no cohesive geographic or taxonomic theming. The zoo also has a pretty ugly map, which I hope they replace with a sleeker, modern design. Obviously, the issues with zoo layout and map design are not as important as the issues with exhibit quality and animal welfare, and so these complaints are not as serious as my previous ones. But going forward, it would be nice for Capron to think more about layout, immersion, and theming as they implement their masterplan. Overall Thoughts Overall, I would describe Capron as a nice, quaint, small local zoo. The zoo clearly has a lot of work to do in the future with integrating their masterplan, but I still enjoyed my time here. The place has a great atmosphere and personality and some really charismatic animals. And it is always fun to experience a zoo that you have never been to before for the first time. If you visit, I’d recommend squeezing the trip in with another zoo on the same day. Depending on how much you’re willing to drive, Capron can be combined with several nearby zoological institutions, including the Roger Williams Park Zoo, Buttonwood Park Zoo, Southwick’s Zoo, the WWI Memorial Park and Petting Zoo, and some of Rhode Island’s small science centers and aquariums. As previously mentioned, there were some aspects of Capron that I did not get to fully experience on my visit, like the temporarily closed rainforest building. And looking towards the future, the zoo is currently developing a new entrance and pollinator garden, which will hopefully come out well (source). So, I am looking forward to seeing how these changes develop over the ensuing months. And I will be excited to return to this charming zoo in the spring or summer of next year, when I may be able to get an even fuller picture of what Capron has to offer. Butterfly Boardwalk Coming Soon by ZooElephantsMan posted 22 Aug 2022 at 1:51 AM
I appreciate your review, it's always nice to hear what someone has to say about a zoo I've been visiting my whole life, and at one point was a volunteer at. Most of your review I feel is very fair, and I agree with many of your criticisms. One thing that surprises me is you singling out amur leopard as your least favorite exhibit- as I can name quite a few habitats at Capron that I'd rank below the leopard habitat. While Lacey's habitat is far from the zoo's best habitat, its also rather standard for a leopard habitat in an AZA facility. Sure, it's easily overlooked by the two phenomenal leopard habitats down the road in Stone and Roger Williams, but not necessarily a terrible habitat either. Personally, the habitat I'd consider to be the zoo's worst is the serval habitat, but I respect your opinion as well. It's a shame you weren't able to see the Rainforest exhibit. It's my personal favorite part of Capron, although the bird collection has unfortunately decreased substantially in recent years. Really my biggest criticism of the zoo, and what pains me to see, is how much the collection has declined in recent years. Over the past seven or eight years, there have been very few new additions at the zoo compared to a lot of animals that have either passed away or left the zoo. Hopefully over the next few years the zoo gets some new additions to the collection.
Appearance-wise, I would agree that the serval habitat was probably worse than the amur leopard habitat-- I mostly singled out the leopard habitat because the stereotypic behavior there was much worse than anything else I saw in the rest of the zoo. Its funny you mentioned the servals though, because I was originally thinking about mentioning them when I was writing. When I got to their exhibit, I immediately realized where your profile picture is taken from! From a zoo design / speculation perspective, I thought it could be a good idea for Capron to phase leopards out, give the servals access to that outdoor exhibit, and then use the servals' indoor exhibit for a smaller animal.
I'd disagree with moving the servals into the outdoor Leopard habitat for one big reason: winters. Unless an indoor habitat was also provided, the servals would be stuck in an off-exhibit holding for the winters, and the Leopard holdings would not be an ideal winter scenario for the servals. In my personal opinion, I'd like to see the entire Sadler Building demolished, inside and out. It was poorly built in the 60's and the habitats are really an awkward size and set-up for a lot of uses. If I could single out one part of the zoo I'd like to see gone and replaced with something modern, Sadler would be it. And yeah, Lacey will pace some. It's something that from what I've noticed is more prevalent since the closure and re-opening to the COVID- not sure if it's related or not, but certainly an odd coincidence if it's not. I haven't been in a year though so don't know if it's changed at all. It's also something that I wonder what effect individuality has on the pacing, as prior to Lacey the zoo had a different amur leopard and prior to that numerous snow Leopards in that exhibit, and before Lacey I never really saw any stereotypy.
I was wondering if the building used to be more thematic, or if it was always intended to hold a hodge podge of animals with no discernable theme. Part of me wondered if the interior used to hold larger animals (like some sort of horrible lion house?), before being changed to be more ethical and to hold random smaller species over time.
You're exactly correct- former Big Cat House featuring lions and tigers. In fact, if you look closely at the glass on the Meerkat and fruit bat habitats, you'd notice some scratches on the glass left behind by the big cats that formerly called the building home. After that, it became an Africa-themed building (hence the murals on the wall), featuring four habitats from different biomes. Syke's Monkeys were eventually replaced with Black-and-White-Ruffed Lemurs, and eventually they were moved to make way for Debrazza's Monkeys. Servals and Meerkats have always been in their current exhibits, and the fruit bat exhibit was originally home to the silvery-cheeked hornbills, followed by golden lion tamarins/red-rumped agouti, another stint with the hornbills (they moved around a lot), Indian Crested Porcupine and some smaller birds, and now finally the fruit bats- who were moved from the Rainforest due to COVID concerns.
I just read this thread after visiting Capron yesterday. We made several meandering laps around the zoo trying to see animals that weren't always visible or active. FWIW, regarding the comments about the leopard pacing, I never saw this behavior. At various times throughout the afternoon, the leopard was sleeping, sitting, walking slowly, laying awake, alerted by various noises, and looking off in various directions. She was sometimes at the back of the habitat and sometimes at the front of the habitat, but I never saw pacing stereotypic behavior. Also, regarding comments about the serval exhibit being small, the serval exhibit is currently closed and covered by tarps. I don't know what the plans are for that. From what little I could see between the gaps in the tarps, I think it's gutted out and the glass removed. Edit: typos
Interesting news. The zoo has a very long history with servals (including as the zoo's post-polar bear mascot), so I'd be very surprised if this species leaves the collection. Would be interesting to see what becomes of this exhibit, whether it's a renovation/repair of the serval habitat (the habitat has stayed virtually untouched in my lifetime) or whether the zoo is doing something new with that space.
Technically, it was the current lion and Sloth bear exhibits, before they were separated. There was a different polar bear exhibit first (that doesn't exist any more), but the big polar bear exhibit of the '80s was the lion/Sloth bear exhibits. After Frosty's passing, both halves held Sloth bears (back when Amy and Goof were breeding), but once the breeding of bears stopped the door between the exhibits was sealed shut and lions were placed in one half.
I was under the impression that the current lion was polar and the current sloth was lion. Thanks for clearing that up. First time I visited the current lion was empty and had been for a bit while sloth bear were in their current location
Yeah, when there were cubs, Goof's exhibit was the current lion exhibit, while Amy would raise cubs in the current sloth bear exhibit. Rest of the year the bears were together though. Sadler Building used to be the cat house. There are some scratches on the glass for the meerkat/fruit bat exhibits from when lions and tigers used to call that building home!
Ah that makes sense. Was the rainforest an elephant house at one point? Capron is one of my favorite small zoos growing up in New England. Any additional history would be a lot of interest to me
You're getting your new england zoos mixed up, lol. Tropical America at Roger Williams Park Zoo was a former elephant house (home to Alice I). Capron has never had elephants in its history. The Samuel Stone Rainforest Building opened back in the 1960's as a Tropical Rainforest. A ground-breaking exhibit for its time, as this was in the decade prior to the history-making Rainforest Buildings of Topeka and Sedgwick County Zoos. It was primarily a Tropical Asia building for some point in its history- with Indian Crested Porcupines, Indian Flying Fox, Victorian Crowned Pigeons, and other birds, although eventually the zoo deviated from this with the weid's marmosets, two-toed sloths, violet turaco, red-crested cardinals, and poison dart frogs. Originally, and bizarrely enough, the zoo exhibited North American River Otters in the Rainforest Building.
Lol yes and no on my confusion. I did think elephants were kept at Capron, because every older zoo in New England pretty much did. Didn't realize that was built strictly as a rainforest building. I knew RWPZ tropical house was and also Beardsley. Was Caprons Noc house a monkey house or always night species? Lol nevermind, I found the Capron History thread from last year (which I posted on)
Yes- it was at one point the monkey house, unfortunately before my time. I've tried to do some looking and trying to figure out what species of Primates were inside it, but nothing ever lead anywhere. Prior to being a monkey house, the building was the entire zoo, including big cats! Yeah, elephants and polar bears are the two species it seems like everyone in New England used to keep. Capron is the anomaly with elephants, and Buttonwood is the anomaly with polar bears. At least elephants are still present in New England (for now), but I'd love it if polar bears made an (admittedly unlikely) return to anywhere in the region.
If given the choice, I prefer the polar bears over elephants. Especially given the history of polar bears in the region (RWP, Stone, Ecotarium etc.) Capron will especially never consider polar again but appreciate seeing at least one of the Asian bear species in the area
Agreed. Capron is unlikely to get either species, but if given the choice, long-term I'd rather see polar bears in the region than elephants. In addition to the historical reasons you named, they are also better climactically suited for New England as can be outdoors in colder temperatures. Furthermore, the spatial requirements for elephants is larger than that of polar bears, meaning that it'd take less sacrifice to house them long-term, versus elephants where if RWPZ decides to keep them long-term it'd likely be at the sacrifice of multiple other exhibits.
Also agreed in terms of spacing and climate, though, and always have to say, successful elephants programs are quite possible in the north despite the climate. But also all the elephant programs in New England are just holders any how. I'm still not convinced RWP will be long term and hope Buttonwood sticks with GoH as replacements for the old ladies. As you well know there's not much diversity in that neck of the U.S.
