"The Omaha zoo has received another big accolade: “largest” in the world. Our Henry Doorly Zoo & Aquarium is not the world's biggest zoo in area, but the travel website touropia.com ranks it as the largest by combining geographic size with number of species. It's an unusual methodology, but Omaha zoo Director Dennis Pate said: “We'll take it.” Touropia ranks the Columbus Zoo in Ohio as eighth-largest, the Moscow Zoo seventh and the San Diego Zoo sixth. The Toronto Zoo is No. 5, the Bronx Zoo is No. 4, the Beijing Zoo is No. 3 and the Beijing Zoological Garden is No. 2. And there at the top sits Omaha. “Although there are bigger zoos in terms of acreage or species numbers,” the site says, “none rank as high as the Henry Doorly Zoo if both these categories are combined. For this reason, it is listed here as the largest zoo in the world.” Touropia also notes that the Omaha zoo features the largest cat complex in North America, the world's largest indoor desert and the largest geodesic dome. Pate, who has led the zoo for four years, paid tribute to his predecessor, Dr. Lee Simmons. “Doc built something special here.” The zoo, which also has been ranked best by TripAdvisor, Huffington Post and Family Fun magazine, is listed as having 130 acres and 17,000 animals of 962 species. Last year it set its attendance record, exceeding 1.7 million visitors. With the razing of nearby Rosenblatt Stadium, Dennis said, parking spaces are increasing by nearly 50 percent, to about 3,000...." Kelly: Travel website hails Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo as largest in world - Omaha.com ~Thylo
good to see some major flaws.... Zoo Berlin has more species per acre, as has Vogelpark Walsrode, as do many of the smaller city zoos such as Antwerp and Artis Amsterdam (both around 500 species at 30-34 acres)... The world largest indoor desert is in Arnhem, Burgers Desert. And isn't the zoo world largest geodesic dome Gondwanaland....
Like the name of the zoo in the thread title... Why would you even bothering using "species density" to describe "largest zoo"? What a stupid idea. Note that the quoted (but not in quote marks) article actually mis-represents the original article, by suggesting the number 2 spot goes to the "Beijing Zoological Garden" when it in fact goes to the Berlin Zoological Garden.
Just noticed that. For some reason I always spell Omaha, Ohama. I copied and pasted what I put in my first post. The article does, in fact, say "Beijing Zoological Gardens." And it is in quotation marks. ~Thylo
OK, I meant in the quote box thing. And I know that your article says Beijing Zoological Gardens were #2, but that is not what is in the original list (8 Largest Zoos in the World | Touropia) that your article was based on. That list quite clearly says Berlin Zoological Gardens, and presumably the columnist made a typo when paraphrasing it.
I would love to see that zoo! Their Madagascar exhibit looks amazing. They have some species that I’ve never before seen in captivity. Their butterfly exhibit looks really nice, too. I guess I will need to plan a visit to Omaha!
then I do not know which photo's you have seen and I not, but the ones that appear at zoochat are not appealing at all...
