The first news of 2020 is actually about plants. A display of over 1,200 orchids will go on exhibit in February: Toledo Zoo hosts display of orchids in February
The Toledo Zoo have announced plans for new Tiger and Bear exhibits. Plans for new bear, tiger exhibit at zoo concern some neighbors Nathan Decker, project manager in the zoo’s construction department, said the $10 million to $15-million exhibit would include a meshed-over outdoor area and would hold the zoo’s three brown bears and four Amur tigers, two of which the zoo already has, with the other two to come from a unspecified number that the zoo is planning to acquire. The exhibit would be located in the northern part of the zoo and would replace the existing 175-spot employee parking lot near Spencer Street and several houses that the zoo has purchased under the institutional campus zoning of the zoo, he said. The employees would then park at the zoo’s other parking facilities that exceed 2,000 spots total, according to zoo staff. The exhibit would have a “museum-like” setting to include informational stands about the animals and their life in the wild, according to event organizers. Mr. Decker said the project is in its design phase. Construction was originally planned to begin in November, 2020, but was then pushed back a year to begin in November, 2021, he said. With construction expected to take about 18 months, the exhibit wouldn’t open to public before May, 2023. Contractors would be determined in a competitive bidding process once the project is approved by the city, he said. “The goal of this whole exhibit is to highlight the role of large predators in the world [where] they help sustain populations of different species in the wild,” Mr. Decker said. “The public will benefit from being able to see those animals in a different way [from now] — being more active and displaying more of their natural behaviors in the wild.”
The lodge is being turned into an interactive children’s zoo. It is mentioned at the end of the video.
Link below has info on the new Farmland area at the former African Lodge. Toledo Zoo Safari Magazine- Habitats
New baby Bornean orangutan: It has been announced that a baby Bornean Orangutan was born October 12th, 2019 to first-time parents Leela and Bajik. He has been named Fajar (his name means Dawn or start of a new day in Indonesian) Baby orangutan born at Toledo Zoo
By Primate Forest. I put the link to the new map below to help you understand where it is located. Toledo Zoo Map
This may be out of the blue because it's just a random thing to ask, but any status on the aquarium's Japanese codling? Last visit I couldn't take a good glimpse for it was kept with spider crabs and their deep sea isopods at both points, and the current deep sea area was closed off my July 2020 visit, so I couldn't determine anything (also the fact that being a strange creature, I found nothing on Google of this individual or even other zoos/aquariums keeping this species in the U.S.)...
A male Western lowland gorilla was born August 12: It's a boy! Zoo announces birth of endangered gorilla with Facebook post Michael Frushour, the zoo’s curator of mammals, said the infant western lowland gorilla is the second live gorilla birth at the Toledo Zoo since 2003. The baby gorilla, who hasn’t been named yet, was born to 18-year-old Sufi and fathered by the zoo’s only adult male gorilla, 32-year-old Kwisha. It’s the first time Sufi gave birth to a live baby, he said. She had a stillborn baby in 2018.
Well, I’m going to go to the zoo for the first time this year tomorrow. Wish me luck seeing a lot of animals!
Well, today I visited the zoo as I said I would, and immediately it was obvious that they weren’t handling the whole social distancing thing very well. Despite the pandemic, crowds were as dense as ever, and far too many people weren’t wearing masks. Detroit has definitely done a much better job reopening in the world of COVID-19, requiring visitors to book online reservations in advance due to the limited capacity allowed and having signs everywhere about the importance of mask-wearing and social distancing. In fact, it’s been a long-standing tradition of our family to visit the zoo during the holidays for the “Lights Before Christmas”, but my mom is already planning on buying tickets for the Detroit Zoo’s holiday lights show instead because of the dissatisfaction of our experience at Toledo today. Anyways, onto the animals I saw. Today was the first time I remember going to the large mixed-species Africa habitat and not seeing a single giraffe, though I did get to witness an addra gazelle actually attempting to mount a greater kudu. The three cougars that lived in Tiger Terrace, having arrived just a few years ago, already seem to have left the zoo, as there was a tiger in their former habitat and the sign for them was gone. Speaking of Tiger Terrace, I did see the new Patagonian cavy habitat in the area which formerly held the penguins and more recently pelicans. My parents reasonably forbid me from visiting any of the indoor exhibits because of the aforementioned poor pandemic handling the zoo displayed.
2020 Photo Contest Winner: Corey Wyckoff To paraphrase the article. The Association of Zoos & Aquariums awarded Toledo Zoo resident photographer and videographer an award for his work. I personally know Corey, and he is a great person that deserves celebration of his photos. If anybody is visiting the Toledo Zoo & Aquarium in December 2020, then you can see a film at the zoo's amphitheater of various animals as they reside in a snowy wonderland. The film projected on stage features a North American river otter, Cheetahs, Watusi cattle, Gray Wolves (arctic phase), Snowy Owl, and others I believe. I can provide an animal's name if you message me on this website.
Toledo Zoo has recorded the first case of biofluoresence in Tasmanian devils! Toledo Zoo first to record biofluorescence in Tasmanian Devils | wtol.com
