Taronga Zoo Great Southern Oceans

sweet im going to the zoo on friday! ill see if i can get some photos unless someone is going earlier that then tey can take some...

 

i ent on thursday last week, and was upst to hear i only missed out again by a few days- like my melbourne trip mising orangs by just weeks.

 

Today's Daily Telegraph newspaper here in Sydney has done the right thing by Taronga with a marvellous 4 page wrap-around cover dedicated to the opening of Great Southern Oceans. It includes a terrific aerial shot of the whole exhibit with each of the features clearly labelled plus individual photos of some of the animals and a write-up about them and how they got to be at Taronga.

Worth keeping.

 

the daily telegraph has given the zoo some very favourable coverage recently, and quite a lot of it too. but the sort of exposure that would have stemmed from today's issue of the DT would be hard to put a dollar value on.
the timing was perfect-two days before the weekend-plenty of time for Sydney family's to plan their weekend trip.
only thing is i wouldnt want to be going to the zoo this weekend. and it will be interesting to see what impact the opening of GSO has on the Aquarium/SWW attraction. undoubtably, this is the Southern Hemisphere's premier marine mammal display, and its a very 'marketable' exhibit. the 2007/2008 annual report will be interesting in terms of visitation. the only thing more likely to generate more visitors than a new exhibit of this scale would be a big, grey baby coming soon to a zoo near me!

 

I've asked this question before but no Aussie has provided an answer. If Taronga's annual attendance is usually hovering somewhere around 1.2 million, then what are the figures for the Sydney Aquarium and Sydney Wildlife World?

 

southern hemisphere's premier marine mammal display eh? did you forget about what lies just 800 or so km north?

Family Holiday, Marine Education, Gold Coast Theme Parks - Sea World | Sea World

or that the southern hemisphere encompasses much of africa, indonesia, new zealand and south america, and all their various "seaworlds"?

 

Oh yeah, we forgot about Sea World - the pseudo "Luna Park" of the Gold Coast, the funfair with polar bears and a few dolphins.

If you want to ride a roller coaster go to Sea World.
Wanna see Leopard Seals? (Three of 'em!) Come to Great Southern Oceans.

 

but come on.......... "premier marine mammal facility?"

roller coasters aside, last i heard seaworld had more pinneped species that taronga, plus dolphins, dugongs, polar bears and some pretty big pools.

 

and an absolutely excellent shark bay with great displays of fish

 

You may have a good point Patrick

 

going to have a look tuesday or wednesday. Whose coming?

 

premier marine mammal display. yep. i think it is.
seaworld may have an excellent shark bay habitat, but sharks are fish arent they? duh.
seaworld may also have an internationally admired polar bear exhibit, but their enclosures for pinnipeds and even the dolphins are far from remarkable.
Hawaii and Japan both have excellent marine life centres, and Auckland Zoo and Sydney Aquarium boast wonderful seal exhibits.
but in terms of scale, innovation and exhibitry I believe GSO raises the bar. and with the debate over whether ceteceans should be in captivity, do we use the presence of dolphins and false whales as a parameter for judging the quality of marine mammal exhibits? i think the fact that GSO focuses exclusively on seals and sea lions is in fact one of its major strengths.

 

Snowleopard: Sydney Aquarium's attendance too hovers around the 1.2 million mark.
Sydney Wildlife World had near 400,000 visitors in the months that it was open according to the annual report that indicated this would translate to about 900,000 in the full year, or something like that.

 

@Interested: thanks for the attendance figures!

Great Southern Oceans certainly appears to be a fabulous exhibit, and it is amazing to see how much work has been completed at Sydney's Taronga Zoo over the past decade. The bottom section of the zoo (Wild Asia, GSO, Backyard to Bush) cost a fortune, but for the most part the exhibits have been tremendous.

P.S. I'm still not thrilled with the size of the asian elephant enclosure...hahaha.

 

Do Taronga have more leopard seals than Brooke, i thought there was a male too?

 

Yes, there is Brooke, Casey the male (came in while we were there collecting data on Brooke ) and Sabine.

 

casey and sabine were actually washed up in the same week in september last year extremely lucky find, and now all 3 are in a captive research prjects, though not a breeding one at this stage.

 

Sabine arrived just after we left. My BF was very happy because he loved Brooke, and KC is his online gaming name. Conditioning of Casey and Sabine is going really well for those who are interested, they are great to work with and eager to train.

 

Also there are some new major mammal exhibits for the near furture