This photo shows less than half the exhibit, which is one of the best chimpanzee enclosures in North America and features an animated group of apes. It is much more realistic and far superior than the relatively new orangutan and gorilla exhibits at the zoo.
Actually, this exhibit is not that old either (only 2 years older than the Orang exhibit). The exhibit opened in 1998 and is way better than what the chimps used to have before. Here is a photo of the old Chimp exhibit at the LA Zoo: Los Angeles Zoo. Old Chimpanzee colony on Flickr - Photo Sharing!
I remember that exhibit. Chimps of the Mahale Mountains is actually a really nice exhibit. The biggest complaint I had when visiting the exhibit was more about the great apes on the outside of the exhibit.
This photo shows less than half the exhibit, which is one of the best chimpanzee enclosures in North America and features an animated group of apes. It is much more realistic and far superior than the relatively new orangutan and gorilla exhibits at the zoo.
I tend to disagree snowleopard. I love the chimp exhibit but wouldn't call it "far superior" to the new campo gorilla reserve. The features of the chimp exhibit that disappoints are the climbing structures next to the viewing windows (should be other structures or trees set further back), and the limited viewing through the windows. They should have used total unobstructed viewing windows. The walls above hinder you. I would one day like to see them make a few adjustments; something like the excellent total glassfront viewing I observed at the Honolulu Zoo.
My main complaint with the gorilla campo reserve; they didn't follow through with the original design we were presented. This included a much more lush habitat, and two family groups on either side of the bachelors. And those mature trees that have been sitting in the old Rhino Yard for years, were obviously left out of the planting. They were to provide the climbing structures now sorely missing from the exhibit. That area was to have been the third yard, along with a revamping of the Bongo exhibit to make up a new jungle environment. And this was all to have cost far less than the 19 million price tag we ended up with. I know, my wife and I were donors for this project.
@Blackduiker: I really appreciate your honesty in assessing the exhibits at your own zoo, as sometimes people can be consumed with passion for their local zoo and rate it much higher than others. I also enjoy the historical perspective that you bring to discussions on the L.A. Zoo, as by all accounts it has steadily improved over the years.
Well I've been around since the beginning snowleopard (1966), and things were bare but new and a far cry from what we had when I was a small child visiting the old zoo. We still have a long ways to go. I'm probably considerably older than most on this site, but not ancient. It just thrills me how much younger individuals like "mstickmanp" are continuing the legacy of pushing for Los Angeles to have the "world class zoo" we were promised by our civic leaders decades ago.
The zoo that opened back in the mid '60s was terribly under funded when compared to what other cities were spending, and we are just now catching up. And hopefully, with the opening of Pachyderm Forest, we'll finally get it right. Hopefully.
