Baltimore has welcomed its 1000th African penguin chick - what a phenomenal accomplishment! 1,000th African penguin chick hatches at The Maryland Zoo
Next week the zoo will announce on the facebook group upcoming construction projects at the zoo. If I had to guess on a modification of any exhibit, I would say they may be finally expanding their elephant exhibit.
Here's a link to their announcement and plans to expand and renovate the elephant, giraffe, and lion exhibits: African Journey Renovation - The Maryland Zoo in Baltimore
Thanks for posting. These plans are very exciting and long overdue. The elephant exhibit will become almost 1.8 acres in size, the giraffe exhibit will be 0.8 acres and lions are always very popular carnivores at any zoo. It is terrific to see Maryland Zoo building on the fairly recent success of their penguin complex with this great announcement.
This does look very promising. The giraffe exhibit is already pretty good imo, but this looks like it could become great. Meanwhile, the mediocre lion exhibit looks to be upgraded and the basic and pretty small elephant exhibit could become really good. Plus, elephants and giraffes sharing exhibit space?!? The devil's in the details and then the execution of the plan, but I'm excited for this. After this, the Maryland Zoo will still be limited in terms of species and how long it takes to tour the zoo, but as for what it has, it will pretty much lack noteworthy weaknesses.
So the elephant cow yard will be expanded, but I'm curious if the elephant bull yard will be as well. Tuffy, their male, could really use more space. I am also curious if the okapi yard will be kept in tact or if the species will be phased out to give space to the expansion. I am excited for the changes!
The okapi side of the giraffe house will remain untouched as will the giraffe feeding station on the other and the Oasis snack shack. But other than that, everything on that side of the zoo will be uofradeu.
The zoo has posted an update on construction. They seem to be moving extremely fast, having finished much of the rockwork containment, installed new fencing for the elephants, and has built new shade structures. They anticipate opening in summer 2019, although from the pictures it seems like the opening will be phased, as the elephant area is pretty far along already. African Journey Construction Update: 7/20/18 | The Maryland Zoo
There is a new prehensile-tailed porcupine in the Embassy named Rico. He is from the National Zoo. A tawny frogmouth named Huey arrived from the Woodland Park Zoo. New hornbill chicks! Named Klaus and Clara New duiker! Named Flower and from NEW Zoo. A spur-winged lapwing is on exhibit in the African Aviary. New prairie dog pups! Edgar, one of the zoo's ravens, has passed away :-( The Kune Kune pigs are named Orville and Wilbur New ravens named Thor and Odin and a new lemur named Alfredo.
The polar bears managed to find their way into an empty holding area. Hide and seek: Baltimore zoo's polar bears briefly wander from habitat into holding area
The zoo has posted a bunch of photos showing the progress of construction: African Journey Construction Update: 1/25/19 | The Maryland Zoo
