Rhinos, Hippos, Elephants, and Giraffes in the top 80 US Zoos.

R

RhinoHippoElephantGiraffe

Well-Known Member
This is my first thread on ZooChat. It took me more than three months to find out how to create new threads! Here are the top 80 US zoos with which of the four "Giant Mammals" that they have. All (sub)species count, except for Pygmy Hippos. Only River Hippos count for this. This is as of May 6th, 2022. Correct me if I'm wrong about something on this list.

ABQ BioPark - all
Akron - NONE
Arizona-Sonora-Desert-Museum - NONE
Atlanta - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Audubon - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Binder Park - giraffes
Birmingham - elephants and giraffes
Bronx - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Brookfield - rhinos and giraffes
Buffalo - rhinos and giraffes
Busch Gardens - all
Caldwell - elephants and giraffes
Cameron Park - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Central Park - NONE
Cheyenne Mountain - all
Cincinnati - all
Cleveland - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Columbus - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Como Park - giraffes
Dallas - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
Detroit - rhinos and giraffes
Disney's Animal Kingdom - all
El Paso - elephants and giraffes
Fort Wayne - giraffes
Fort Worth - all
Fresno Chaffee - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Gladys Porter - rhinos and giraffes
Great Plains - rhinos and giraffes
Henry Villas - rhinos and giraffes
Honolulu - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
Houston - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Indianapolis - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Jacksonville - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
John Ball - NONE
Kansas City - all
Knoxville - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Lincoln Park - rhinos and giraffes
Little Rock - rhinos and elephants
Living Desert - rhinos and giraffes
Los Angeles - elephants and giraffes
Louisville - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Maryland - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Memphis - all
Miami - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Milwaukee County - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
Minnesota - NONE
Montgomery - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Nashville - rhinos and giraffes
North Carolina - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Oakland - elephants and giraffes
Oklahoma City - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Omaha - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Oregon - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Philadelphia - rhinos, hippos, and giraffes
Phoenix - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Pittsburgh - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Point Defiance - NONE
Reid Park - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Riverbanks - rhinos and giraffes
Roger Williams Park - elephants and giraffes
Rosamond Gifford - elephants
Sacramento - giraffes
Saint Louis - all
San Antonio - all
San Diego Zoo - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
San Diego Zoo Safari Park - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
San Francisco - rhinos and giraffes
Santa Barbara - giraffes
Sedgwick County - all
Smithsonian's National Zoo - elephants
Tampa - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Tanganyika Wildlife Park - rhinos and giraffes
Toledo - all
Topeka - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
Tulsa - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Utah's Hogle - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Virginia - rhinos and giraffes
Wildlife World - rhinos and giraffes
Woodland Park - rhinos, hippos, and giraffes

Adventure Aquarium in New Jersey is a top 20 US aquarium and has hippos.
 
tigris115 said:
I find it surprising that not a lot of these zoos have hippos. Water bills?
Click to expand...

They take up a lot of space, cost a lot to feed, and don't do much, compared to species with similar space requirements. Water adds to that, since it's something they need that rhinos don't. Most zoos with them have also been building new, large exhibits with underwater viewing.
 
No zoos in the United States keep rhinos, River Hippos, elephants, giraffes, and gaurs (the 5th largest land mammal on earth). Africam Safari in Puebla, Mexico does however, keep all five.
 
I realise this is your first thread, so don't take this the wrong way, but some additional explanations might be in order. My immediate thought is what makes these zoos the "top 80"? Who ranked these and why?

Same for the mention of "Adventure Aquarium in New Jersey is a top 20 US aquarium and has hippos" - by whose ranking and why?
 
Chlidonias said:
I realise this is your first thread, so don't take this the wrong way, but some additional explanations might be in order. My immediate thought is what makes these zoos the "top 80"? Who ranked these and why?

Same for the mention of "Adventure Aquarium in New Jersey is a top 20 US aquarium and has hippos" - by whose ranking and why?
Click to expand...

I think they're using snowleopard's ranking from his book.
 
RhinoHippoElephantGiraffe said:
This is my first thread on ZooChat. It took me more than three months to find out how to create new threads! Here are the top 80 US zoos with which of the four "Giant Mammals" that they have. All (sub)species count, except for Pygmy Hippos. Only River Hippos count for this. This is as of May 6th, 2022. Correct me if I'm wrong about something on this list.

ABQ BioPark - all
Akron - NONE
Arizona-Sonora-Desert-Museum - NONE
Atlanta - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Audubon - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Binder Park - giraffes
Birmingham - elephants and giraffes
Bronx - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Brookfield - rhinos and giraffes
Buffalo - rhinos and giraffes
Busch Gardens - all
Caldwell - elephants and giraffes
Cameron Park - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Central Park - NONE
Cheyenne Mountain - all
Cincinnati - all
Cleveland - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Columbus - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Como Park - giraffes
Dallas - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
Detroit - rhinos and giraffes
Disney's Animal Kingdom - all
El Paso - elephants and giraffes
Fort Wayne - giraffes
Fort Worth - all
Fresno Chaffee - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Gladys Porter - rhinos and giraffes
Great Plains - rhinos and giraffes
Henry Villas - rhinos and giraffes
Honolulu - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
Houston - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Indianapolis - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Jacksonville - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
John Ball - NONE
Kansas City - all
Knoxville - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Lincoln Park - rhinos and giraffes
Little Rock - rhinos and elephants
Living Desert - rhinos and giraffes
Los Angeles - elephants and giraffes
Louisville - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Maryland - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Memphis - all
Miami - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Milwaukee County - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
Minnesota - NONE
Montgomery - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Nashville - rhinos and giraffes
North Carolina - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Oakland - elephants and giraffes
Oklahoma City - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Omaha - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Oregon - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Philadelphia - rhinos, hippos, and giraffes
Phoenix - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Pittsburgh - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Point Defiance - NONE
Reid Park - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Riverbanks - rhinos and giraffes
Roger Williams Park - elephants and giraffes
Rosamond Gifford - elephants
Sacramento - giraffes
Saint Louis - all
San Antonio - all
San Diego Zoo - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
San Diego Zoo Safari Park - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
San Francisco - rhinos and giraffes
Santa Barbara - giraffes
Sedgwick County - all
Smithsonian's National Zoo - elephants
Tampa - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Tanganyika Wildlife Park - rhinos and giraffes
Toledo - all
Topeka - hippos, elephants, and giraffes
Tulsa - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Utah's Hogle - rhinos, elephants, and giraffes
Virginia - rhinos and giraffes
Wildlife World - rhinos and giraffes
Woodland Park - rhinos, hippos, and giraffes

Adventure Aquarium in New Jersey is a top 20 US aquarium and has hippos.
Click to expand...

I have a question, and again absolutely no offence intended but I'm genuinely curious as to why you did this? Is it to look into trends across the US? If so I'd be interested to see how it varies across the country and if there are trends therein but for now it's rather hard to unpack given the seemingly odd categories and arbitrary list of zoos...
 
amur leopard said:
I have a question, and again absolutely no offence intended but I'm genuinely curious as to why you did this? Is it to look into trends across the US? If so I'd be interested to see how it varies across the country and if there are trends therein but for now it's rather hard to unpack given the seemingly odd categories and arbitrary list of zoos...
Click to expand...
The list is not random. It is the four largest land mammals. The list of zoos is not arbitrary, the poster is using the 100 best zoos book by snowleopard.
 
tiger stingray said:
The list is not random. It is the four largest land mammals. The list of zoos is not arbitrary, the poster is using the 100 best zoos book by snowleopard.
Click to expand...

Just in case my question wasn't clear - what is the purpose of this?
As for the largest land mammal thing, the four species may be the heaviest but what relevance does this have on the zoo front? I think much more interesting analyses would be looking into distribution of species of a certain taxonomic group, or of species with the greatest space requirements (which of course is not the same as four heaviest land mammals). I really don't mean to offend but it just puzzles me as to why you did it.
 
With respect to the other posters, I don't see any problem with the thread concept itself. We do already have threads detailing where these animals can be found, but combining the four together does provide some interesting comparison and is a resource in case someone likes multiple of these animals and wanted to maximize seeing them. It also appears to be largely accurate and up-to-date, which is commendable. The answer to "what is the purpose of this" can easily just be "it's interesting and could potentially be useful to someone", which is ultimately the answer to why we post a lot of things on the forum.

The couple of things I would echo as helpful for future posts @RhinoHippoElephantGiraffe: 1) make it clear why you chose the list of zoos you did/what resource you got it from (in this case I knew where you got it from, but others may not), and 2) including more info about the particular species provides more useful information. Also not sure why you'd exclude Pygmy Hippo when it's a kind of hippo, that part does seem confusingly arbitrary... but at least you were clear about it in the OP. Overall good work.

amur leopard said:
As for the largest land mammal thing, the four species may be the heaviest but what relevance does this have on the zoo front? I think much more interesting analyses would be looking into distribution of species of a certain taxonomic group, or of species with the greatest space requirements (which of course is not the same as four heaviest land mammals).
Click to expand...

I agree those analyses sound interesting, but I don't see how comparing four of the largest land mammals across facilities isn't relevant to anything. It is a somewhat apples-to-oranges comparison, but you can still glean things from those. Take this old thread I did for example, which had a more defined logic behind it but is a similar concept: Evaluation of Popular Taxa in Major US Zoos & Aquaria

tigris115 said:
I find it surprising that not a lot of these zoos have hippos. Water bills?
Click to expand...
TinoPup said:
Most zoos with them have also been building new, large exhibits with underwater viewing.
Click to expand...

Largely these two things - American zoos like building hippo exhibits with underwater viewing, which requires expensive filtration systems to be of any use. It's also a species for which the views on husbandry have changed in recent years, which I suspect has led some zoos to phase them out rather than make expensive new exhibits for them.
 
I’m curious how these figures have changed in the last decade after AZA’s elephant rules were implemented. I know a lot of zoos have replaced elephants with rhinos, probably resulting in a big shift in the numbers. I’m sick and might try to compile that information if I’m bored enough for long enough.
 
Some Other facts are:
- 12/80 zoos have all four giant mammals.
- 5/80 zoos have none of them.
- None of the top 80 zoos keep hippos and NOT giraffes (Adventure Aquarium doesn't count).
- Only the Little Rock Zoo has two of the four largest mammals (elephants and rhinos) and are without giraffes.
- 71/80 zoos have giraffes.
- No zoo has rhinos, but no hippos, elephants, or giraffes.
 
Here is a list of zoos that no longer have all four, but had all four at one point in the last 10 years:
- Birmingham (hippos 2020, rhinos 2022)
- Cleveland (hippos 2014)
- Honolulu (rhinos 2022)
- Los Angeles (rhinos 2017, hippos 2022)
- Milwaukee County (rhinos 2021)
- Oregon (hippos 2018)
- San Diego Zoo (rhinos 2022)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top