At the beginning of this year, @lintworm began what’s arguably the best written ZooChat thread of all time. Now as we arrive at the end of the year, it's time to follow it up with another spiritual successor.
Ever since I finished America’s 50 Must See Zoos, I’ve been slowly working on the sequel: America’s 100 Must See Exhibits. I found it was a much greater challenge working on this project, so I am extremely excited to finally get this started. With so many different types of exhibits to choose from, it’s slightly more subjective what constitutes as “must-see” and if we all drafted up a list no two would be the same. The word "exhibit" is used in the broadest possible sense of the term. It could be anything from a single obscure aviary to a large complex consisting of many enclosures. The US is well known for spending tens of millions of dollars to construct new exhibits, but expensive mega-complexes won’t dominate the list. I’m anticipating that even those who frequent the US forums will be unaware of at least several selections which will make this all the more interesting.
Roughly 50 zoos are represented on this list, with about half of them having more than one entry. There’s a notion that American zoos generally feel more similar to one another than their counterparts across the pond, but that greatly undersells the amount of unique and creative exhibits they do have to offer. The US has some of the greatest diversity in biomes and climate anywhere in the world, which enables the creation of exhibits that wouldn’t be possible in many European nations. Like Europe’s 100 Must See Exhibits, the order exhibits will be presented is completely random, but no zoo will have two exhibits featured back to back. Additionally, I will be doing a few bonus posts every now and then which will touch on certain topics involving “must-see” exhibits, although I will be keeping those a secret for now. Every exhibit profile will also include a brief look at similar exhibits if there are any, so by the time this thread is complete there will end up being many more than just 100 exhibits given the spotlight.
With all that said, let’s get this show on the road!
Ever since I finished America’s 50 Must See Zoos, I’ve been slowly working on the sequel: America’s 100 Must See Exhibits. I found it was a much greater challenge working on this project, so I am extremely excited to finally get this started. With so many different types of exhibits to choose from, it’s slightly more subjective what constitutes as “must-see” and if we all drafted up a list no two would be the same. The word "exhibit" is used in the broadest possible sense of the term. It could be anything from a single obscure aviary to a large complex consisting of many enclosures. The US is well known for spending tens of millions of dollars to construct new exhibits, but expensive mega-complexes won’t dominate the list. I’m anticipating that even those who frequent the US forums will be unaware of at least several selections which will make this all the more interesting.
Roughly 50 zoos are represented on this list, with about half of them having more than one entry. There’s a notion that American zoos generally feel more similar to one another than their counterparts across the pond, but that greatly undersells the amount of unique and creative exhibits they do have to offer. The US has some of the greatest diversity in biomes and climate anywhere in the world, which enables the creation of exhibits that wouldn’t be possible in many European nations. Like Europe’s 100 Must See Exhibits, the order exhibits will be presented is completely random, but no zoo will have two exhibits featured back to back. Additionally, I will be doing a few bonus posts every now and then which will touch on certain topics involving “must-see” exhibits, although I will be keeping those a secret for now. Every exhibit profile will also include a brief look at similar exhibits if there are any, so by the time this thread is complete there will end up being many more than just 100 exhibits given the spotlight.
With all that said, let’s get this show on the road!
This thread looks super promising, I can't wait to see what you have in store.
