I have visited Lincoln Park Zoo three times since my previous post, giving me some additional insight into my own proposals:
After visiting in person and doing some ugly map mock-ups I can think about this with more specifics.
The current ungulate barn will be dismantled and a new building similar in size and exterior style to Primate House will replace it. The indoor exhibit will include small mammals, birds and herps including northern tree shrew, pygmy slow loris, bali myna, chinese alligator, and burmese python. Asian small-clawed otters, red panda, and francois langurs will have indoor/outdoor access. Four of the existing yards will remain for hoofstock, retaining camel, takin, and milu/deer, though modifications will be made to fit these species better. A fourth exhibit will be set for a new animal, the Malayan tapir, with a large pool and underwater viewing.
The remaining outdoor yards will be modified in places to allow for habitats for returning Siberian tiger and Amur leopard, and a new Snow leopard habitat.
An additional new species will be included, -- an exhibit similar to the meshed chimpanzee habitat will be consructed on one side of the building to house a meshed mixed gibbon-orangutan exhibit.
The area is four acres, and Milwaukee's current elephant exhibit is an acre and a half I'm told, so it's possible this area could be modified to include elephants, but for my current mock-up I chose to exclude them, and the thought of introducing tapir and orangutan is pretty exciting.
I neglected to figure out exactly where to place the doors and I did not think too hard about dividing the lines for the cat exhibits, and I'm very bad at drawing silhouettes.
As a further last-ditch plan if I cannot find space for Australian animals in Small Mammal-Reptile House (see below) this could become an Australasia exhibit with space for wallaby, frilled lizard, kookaburra, but I do feel like this is stretching the space too far and did not include in the mock-up.
The zoo was ahead of me on some of this -- the atrium has held Diana Monkey instead of Colobus for years, with spoonbill and stork in free-flight. I would not change that lovely spot. The waterhole has Plains zebra. I would still like to see ostrich and some kind of antelope/gazelle brought into the space.
Pepper Family Wildlife Center will have open space where the red panda and snow leopard are currently. I am unsure how to best fill the space. I did mention serval in my previous post but I am unsure.
With fresh eyes on the building, it is both easier and harder to speculate. My growing concern is limiting the animals that can be held without skylights, but I am unsure if the building could be renovated to accomodate as such.
The best possible renovation in my mind to convert to a neotropical bulding could involve a large mixed exhibit including the existing titi, black howler, callimoco, white-faked saki, golden-headed lion tamarin, pied tamarin, and sloth, adding squirrel monkey, agouti, capybara, red-footed tortoise, and tamandua to the same mixed space, now taking up the combined footprint of multiple existing habitats. A separate indoor/outdoor exhibit includes spider monkey specifically, where the current gibbon enclosure is, and additional indoor exhibits feature spectacled caiman, prehensile-tailed porcupine/armadillo, a macaw species, toucan, and if still possible, ocelot. There are a number of new species present here, of course, all fairly easily acquired.
Unfortunately, the debrazza monkeys, colobus monkeys, and swamp monkeys will likely be phased out as a result. I love these species but there is no room in African Journey - perhaps a mix with the Diana monkey, but there is likely not enough space - and geographic theming is a priority here.
Small Mammal-Reptile House has now had two monkeys moved out, otters, caiman, tortoise, shrew, loris, procupine, armadillo... there are now six mammals left (bettong, mouse, bushbaby, mole rat, bat, mongoose) with space for more. Crowned lemur will be kept here instead from now on, as lemurs are too big a category imo to ignore. The former porcupine/armadillo nocturnal exhibit will be home for a new nocturnal species -- fennec fox definitely seems one of the easiest to acquire off my head and has a history at the zoo. I think echidna might be another good choice as we could use more Australian life. The shrew exhibit could go to prevost squirrel. The loris exhibit is hard; there aren't many arboreal nocturnal animals that seem easy to acquire for a smaller space.
The caiman and otter exhibits are again more difficult to figure out. Perhaps dwarf caiman can return instead, or spectacled can remain here and dwarf caiman placed in the neotropical building. The zoo is a recent holder for such caiman. The otters currently have two exhibits, one aquatic and one dry but it looks possible to make it aquatic, I have no clue for those spaces.
None of the above is based on the idea of an extensive renovation so much as placing animals in current exhibits -- if more renovation is possible or more space, it will absolutely be an Australia room with wallaby, frilled lizard, and hopefully a few more smaller animals. This is even more crucial with the fact the zoo will no longer have red kangaroo in this plan, so a macropod space is absolutely necessary.
This sounds very unlike me, but I did consider the possibility of kicking out the mammals and doubling down on making it a Reptile House (with parrots, amphibians and insects) but the mole rat display is unique, bats are an abc species, and I am fond of the mongoose and bush baby.
My body count has increased.. we lose Grevy's Zebra, Debrazza's Monkey, Colobus Monkey, Allen's Swamp Monkey, Red Kangaroo, Chacoan Peccary, and possibly Patagonian Mara... but we gain Malayan tapir, Orangutan, Siberian tiger, Chinese alligator, Amur leopard, an antelope or gazelle, Agouti, Tamandua, Capybara, Squirrel Monkey, Spider Monkey, macaw, toucan, possibly Ocelot, Fennec Fox, Prevost Squirrel, and ideally some kind of macropod, possibly an additional Australian species.
