Woodland Park Zoo One Of The 5 Best Zoos In North America

In BlackRhino's defense, he's not alone in an ODD dislike of Omaha! There a few of these "odd" fellows.

 

The leopard I was referring to is given access to a 1500 square foot exhibit during the day so the 50 square foot cage inside is not a problem, where as the tapirs small outdoor space is the largest area they have. I don't think the tapir exhibit is bad, but for an exhibit that is supposedly one of the top 5 in the America I would expect to see the best tapir exhibit in the nation. Same with many other exhibits in Lied Jungle like the clouded leopards and to some extent the pygmy hippos.

 

So they need to have the best exhibit of all the many species that are in the Lied Jungle to be a top 5 exhibit?

Again, it's a great experience, you should really see it yourself before judging too harshly. And it is a very good zoo, easily better than Columbus imo, which I went to just a few days after Omaha.

 

Well take a look at these top 5 exhibits:

Congo Gorilla Forest- Best gorilla, okapi, red river hog exhibits
Arctic Ring of Life- Best Polar Bear exhibit
Asia Trail- Best Giant Panda, Sloth Bear, Red Panda exhibits and one of the best clouded leopard exhibits
Northern Trail- Best grizzly bear exhibit
Oklahoma Trails- Best Mountain Lion, black bear exhibits and one of the best grizzly bear exhibits


Not necessarily saying those exhibits are the 5 best in America but all are certainly highly regarded and certainly contenders for the top 5 best. To answer your question, yes an exhibit that is one of the 5 best in America should definitely have some of the best animal exhibits, not below par ones. I am sure the visitor experiences in Omaha are unparalleled, but it shouldn't be a substitute for below average animal exhibits. It isn't in any of the above mentioned exhibits.

 

There's a big difference between an outdoor exhibit that only has a few species and an indoor jungle with a bunch of species. So we're not comparing apples to apples here. I've only been to Asia Trail out of the ones you mention, and that was before it was done, will go soon though.

To me, the Lied Jungle was the most exciting exhibit I've experienced. It's not great due to space for the animals, it's great because it's an exciting experience. Some of the best or near best exhibits for animals are that in large part due to their size, but they're not necessarily exciting to see, at least not for the normal person.

 

I disagree. Congo Gorilla Forest is clearly the best gorilla exhibit in America for gorillas (simply look through the Bronx Zoo gallery and you will see what I mean). It also provides some of the best visitor experience in any zoo (you can read about those in America's Best Zoos). Most great exhibits for animals are incorporated into excellent visitor experiences. All the new elephant exhibits being built across the country are being built to obviously improve elephant welfare in zoos, but to also provide visitors with a more intimate experience.

 

Your congo example isn't disagreeing with me at all since I wasn't referring to that. Obviously that is considered to be among the premier exhibits in the world and provides excitement along with a great habitat.

The Lied Jungle though is considered the best indoor jungle by many, and while I can't compare it to it's contenders, it's certainly more exciting than seeing a nice elephant exhibit imo.

 

With that classification the San Diego Zoo doesn't have a single world-class exhibit. (lions in EO, fishing cats in Tiger River, cat exhibit in Polar Bear Plunge etc... every single exhibit complex in SD has exhibits that are on the "smaller side") As Allen has said many times, your arguments would carry much more weight if you had actually SEEN any of the exhibits you criticize.

Now back to the real thread. The Woodland Park Zoo is definitely a gorgeous zoo with incredible ground-breaking exhibits. The only place is seems to lack is in the collection (and even that's not too shabby)

 

He continues to think evaluating based on photographs alone is sufficient. But I've already illustrated, with that photo of Pres. Obama & the Brazilian girl, the danger of judging based on still photographs.

By the way, everyone, I'm now putting together plans to go out and see this zoo (and others in the Northwest) for myself. It's been a little while since I've been out there (Jon wrote the Northwest zoo chapters), so I'm quite anxious to get back out there.

 

Sorry I haven't been to that many zoos so I can only base my information off of photos, other reviews, videos, etc. I am always hearing that Lied Jungle is a top 5 exhibit, but I have heard from nearly everyone on this website that the tapir exhibit (and some others) it pretty small.

None of San Diego's exhibits are supposedly top 5 exhibits so its understandable there are some smallish enclosures. My point is that if an exhibit is going to be considered a top 5 exhibit in America it should be next to flawless.

 

Honestly, having been to ALL of these exhibits, I can say that none of them are "flawless". For example, one could say that a "flaw" of Congo Gorilla Forest is that for about 5 months of the year (winter) the exhibit is not nearly as good as it is in the summer. That's a "flaw" that Lied Jungle doesn't have. This doesn't mean the exhibit is "bad", just that it's now "flawless" -- as none are.

 

Well the more animals an exhibit has, the less chance it has of being close to perfect. Same with an indoor exhibit, although with indoors i think it may be easier to make it more exciting and make one feel like they're part of the environment.

I hate to sound like a broken record, but it's just something that should be experienced before coming down too hard on it. I and others likely wouldn't be so defensive about this if you weren't so harsh about it considering you haven't been there.

And I'm guessing the people who have told you that some of the other enclosures are too small are the same people you'd argue with if they were saying that about a zoo you like such as San Diego.

 

Over the last few days I just uploaded another 400 photos of the Woodland Park Zoo into the ZooChat gallery, bringing the total to over 1,700 just for that one zoo. There are many great exhibits in Seattle, and the ones for grizzly bears, river otters, rocky mountain goats, bald eagles, orangutans, lion-tailed macaques, siamangs, lions, patas monkeys, african wild dogs, penguins, jaguars, gorillas, lemurs and duikers are all close to the BEST of their kind in all of North America. The orangutan, jaguar and grizzly bear habitats (all 3 big-name animals) are surely amongst the best in the world, as the ZooChat gallery has over 800 zoos in it and I've only seen a handful of exhibits that are as impressive as the ones for orangs, jags and grizzlies.

Almost every single ZooChatter that has visited the zoo believes it to either be a top 5 or top 10 zoo, and the only knock on the naturalistic exhibits is that at times the animals are extremely difficult to find. However, I've visited the zoo exactly 5 times this year and I rarely miss seeing any of the animals. Sometimes I have to double back to find the jaguar or stand around and wait for one of the ocelots or wolves to come into view...but PATIENCE is rewarded every single time. It takes patience to effectively tour this zoo, but even the sun bears and red ruffed lemurs have been showing themselves lately and other than the red-flanked duikers I see 98% of all the animals. In terms of strictly looking at the exhibits I think that this zoo challenges the Bronx and San Diego in the United States, and when I took an informal pool of ZooChatters in early 2008 Woodland Park ended up being ranked higher than even mighty San Diego (still my all-time favourite zoo).

 

2010 annual plan to the Parks Superintendent
December 1, 2009: (7-page document)

http://www.zoo.org/Document.Doc?id=179

Along with the new, $7.5 million west entry and meerkat exhibit (with 8 meerkats) opening on May 1st, there are some other interesting tidbits of information in the 2010 draft:

- near record 1.2 million visitors in 2009
- planning and design will begin for the sumatran tiger/sloth bear/sun bear area, which is the oldest part of the zoo. In the next few years those 3 grottoes will be demolished or extensively renovated, meaning that the weakest part of the zoo will become yet another immersive addition to the grounds.
- the two young jaguars in award-winning Jaguar Cove will be introduced to each other in 2010.
- Guanay cormorants may be added to the Humboldt penguin exhibit.

 

Woodland Park Zoo is my favourite zoo that I've never been to! I have a copy of their map on my fridge...

Hopefully summer 2010 will be the time I finally get to see it!

 

Thanks for this interesting read, snowleopard. Do you know whether the zoo intend to maintain the asian bears and tigers in that area, as it says in the 2001 Development plan, or will they get something new?

 

I've actually emailed the zoo a number of times recently, as I am extremely excited over the possibility of development on some sort of "Asian" zone for that area of the zoo. There is already an Elephant Forest with Asian elephants, an Asian "Trail of Vines" with lion-tailed macaques, siamangs, orangutans, Indian pythons and Malayan tapirs, so a continuation of that theme across the centre of the zoo would be terrific. The main reason why I'm so elated at the prospect of new exhibits is that that area is the one and only truly substandard section of the zoo. I'd much rather see zoos upgrade their current outdated enclosures than continue to add new species in new exhibits.

ZooChat member "geomorph" made a comment that Woodland Park is a near-flawless zoo, but the 3 ancient grottoes holding sumatran tigers, sloth bears and sun bears are all badly outdated. The zoo has said that all 3 species will definitely be exhibited in the updated complex, along with new additions to the zoo. The planning process has not even begun, as the decision to overhaul that area of the zoo was only made official about a month ago.

More tidbits of info:

- in 2001 the zoo spent $1.5 million to overhaul a hyena enclosure and construct a brand new habitat for African wild dogs. Since then there has been a female hyena (now quite elderly) behind the scenes and off-exhibit somewhere behind one of the gorilla yards.
- at some time or another there have been these species off exhibit in 2009: spotted hyena, red panda, DeBrazza guenon, slow loris.
- 3 flamingo chicks are at the zoo, and flamingos were just added to the zoo in 2008.

 

I didn't know this thread existed until now so have just spent the last ten or so minutes reading it and I'd just like to add that Wood land Park Zoo is probably the only zoo to have an exhibit that inspired a whole zoo. It's African savannah is the inspiration for Werribee Open Range Zoo. I just thought I'd add that to the discussion.

 

The excellent nocturnal house will permanently close on March 1st, and on May 1st the renovations to the Adaptations building will be complete. A new meerkat exhibit (with a mob of 8) will be added to that section of the zoo, along with some animals that will be retained from the closure of the nocturnal house:

Woodland Park Zoo, Seattle, WA - 01.05.2010WPZ Press Release

 

This is really sad! Jon and I were about to release some new "Top 10" lists, including Top 10 Nocturnal Exhibits. We've already had to modify our list once, when the Bronx Zoo's "World of Darkness" closed. Now it looks like we'll have to change our list again -- as Woodland Park's Night House was in our Top 10. Shoot!