To weigh in on food (I forgot to do so when I read that convo a while ago): for what it's worth, @MRJ, I somewhat agree with you that the Internet (or review sites/apps at least) is not the best way to find good restaurants in the US. Most of the really good restaurants I've been to in the States I've learned about through friends, family, or just general word-of-mouth. Some places develop enough of a reputation that they end up being mentioned on multiple travel blogs and food articles too, which I find infinitely more helpful than review sites. That being said, I also agree that American restaurants almost universally serve too large of portions (although I make use of that by taking it home and getting two meals for the price of one ) and I can see how our fast food and casual food chains would seem unappetizing to foreigners. Unfortunately, most zoo food in the US is similar to what you'd find at chains, in both food type and quality... but more expensive, since it's a revenue source for the zoo. Personally, I like to eat cheaper and healthier, so I normally bring food into the zoo rather than buying it there.
I'm in Dallas right now and funnily enough, I found a really good Mexican resteraunt through a food blog today. I think Dallas is a pretty good microcosm for U.S food in general. Most of the food is junky fast-food or extremely unhealthy fare, but if you look a little deeper there are some amazing resteraunts.
Well to be specific at FPZ they have Straw-Colored Fruit Bats and at Tulsa they have Seba's and Jamaican Fruit Bats, so I should have said flying fox/fruit bats. I visited Tampa in 2013 but back then they had a walkthrough specifically for their flying foxes, though the only other zoos I've seen do this are Chester and Bristol in the UK. In European I've seen many more bats in walkthrough exhibits (which is probably another reason why I assumed these were commonplace) and not always just flying fox/fruit bats. Krefeld has long-nosed bats in a free-flight along with epauletted bats for example. ~Thylo
As for walk-thru exhibits in USA, Phoenix Zoo has one with squirrel monkeys. When they were designing it they intended to have three monkey species: squirrel monkeys, howler monkeys and another that I forget. However the USDA would not give them a permit for the two larger species so they had to settle for just the small squirrel monkeys. So in a sense, yes it is illegal in the United States.
Interesting, I wonder if it was from a physical danger standpoint or a disease standpoint that it got denied?
I am not sure. I got the information from @Ituri who I think (not sure) used to volunteer at Phoenix Zoo. Maybe he will see that I tagged him and give us an answer.
Couple others: For bats, the National Aquarium in Baltimore had gray-headed flying foxes free ranging in the Australia pavillion. No idea if this is current. For primates, Omaha had small New World primates free ranging in one part of the Lied Jungle on the floor level path. Again, I'm unsure if this is still true. The National Zoo has tamarins and had titi free roaming in Amazonia. They also famously had golden lion tamarins free ranging outside in the wooded space between the two main pathways for many years, ostensibly as a "boot camp" preparing them for reintroduction. Before Toledo Zoo renovated their aquarium, they had a mini tropical room with tamarins, but I can't remember whether they were enclosed or if they had the run of the room.
I remember seeing fruit bats in a walk-through rainforest building at Sedgwick County Zoo in Wichita, Kansas, in 2001.
@Gondwana NAIB no longer has grey-headed FFs on exhibit, Lied Jungle no longer has free-ranging monkeys, and AFAIK National does not currently have free-ranging lion tamarins. They do still have titis (and just recently emperor tamarins) free-ranging in Amazonia, though. No idea about Toledo.
I'd also like to add Japanese zoos and aquariums to this comparison, although I have yet to visit a zoo in Europe. In general there appear to be more aquariums than zoos in Japan, but there's a large number of each. I'm currently planning a trip to see 10 or so in Nagoya and the Kansai region, my third zoo trip to Japan and the institutions are generally spaced 1.5 hours apart. Most zoos and aquariums in Japan are of a smaller average size than those in the US. Zoos in particular appear a bit shabbier and underfunded compared to American large city zoos, with outdated enclosures and lack of space, but they're gradually doing things like moving monkeys out of small cages into open-air enclosures. I haven't been to any particularly bad zoos, but I've seen pictures of some smaller and lower-budget zoos where megafauna are kept in small cages with bars so dense that you can't photograph them, a real lose-lose situation for animal and viewer. 70-80 percent of Japanese zoo collections have a high degree of overlap, so if you're going on a zoo tour of Japan you can skip a bunch of zoos that don't have any particularly rare species. Some zoos and aquariums will have some species either held by 3-4 other institutions, or completely exclusive species. Unfortunately I find Japanese zoo collections to be most lacking in birds and herps. Penguins, cranes, flamingos, and waterfowl are ubiquitous, but the same few species are everywhere. Reptile houses tend to have a lot of animals you can find in the pet trade, but also endemic snakes and frogs. Making up for this is the focus on mammals endemic species such as Japanese macaque and sika deer subspecies, Japanese serow, Japanese badger, and some institutions have great small mammal collections of native rodents and even moles and shrews! As for aquariums, Japan is probably #1 in the world in terms of aquaculture skill. They can keep a lot of things alive, from charismatic cetaceans, pinnipeds, and sharks, to deep-sea and Antarctic fishes. Most aquariums I've been to keep deep-sea fishes and crustaceans. Aquariums are expensive, with tickets in the range of over 2000 yen, whereas most zoos are 500 yen. As for food venues, unlike American zoos food is actually often cheaper than outside restaurants! Ramen, udon, and curry rice can be around 600 yen. Gift shops are also well-stocked with unique and novel merchandise, some based around obscure animals.
I remember being able to see Blue Sheep in small rocky island exhibit outside then nocturnal house now Monitor Exhibits at Cincinnati Zoo years ago.
On the contrary there's a lot of US that host similar species. It's like America one big zoo cause alot of zoo's have tiger, rhino's, flamingo, penguins, naked mole rats, meerkats, lions, zebra's, snow leopards. It's actually getting very boring cause one zoo is almost the same as another just miles away. Then we have to have the african experience, then the polar experience, let's not forget swing through australia (which too common species, emu's, kangaroos, koala's.
...Shhh back in the day Cincinnati Zoo old bird house. At end where there was a caiman/ crocodile exhibits in the bird building, free roaming squirrel monkey came out of exhibit and sold a camera filter of mine. The little rascal took the filter and went back into the trees of the exhibit. Having protested the little rascal came back to me and gave it back! Mind you little guy could of dropped it into the crocodiles below but didn't. No disease was transmited just human and monkey interaction of reality of the moment. Indeed a moment that is one of my most cherished memories of Cincinnati Zoo.
Bad food, so much for human wellness and being environmental friendly. Course there's that rascal animal called a CASH COW where all he feeds on is money!
Besides the very extensive plants and trees that make up the zoo, once you discover an animal exhibit you get the notion GEE they actually have animals here too!
St. Louis Zoo herpetarium!!! Large building of old building classic structure. Large exhibit for many snakes venomous, and non venomous, lizards, crocodilians. Great place. Story: I was there once during a very bad thunderstorm in the opening hours. Being free zoo I'd first bolted into the reptile house. To my amazement I was only sole in the building! It was fantastic!!! Alot of the snakes were moving around that moment of the day. Later I asked a keeper when he appeared the occurrence of the events. He stated it was due to the heavy atmosphere conditions of the storm on the building causing the snake to react. WoW it was incredible experience to see! The King Cobra moving readily through the bamboo of it's enclosure.
