This was in the current squirrel monkey enclosure, which should only be temporary, and hopefully demolished after the completion of Rainforest of the Americas. The ceiling height for monkeys there is far too low. Why, like at least in several other roundhouses, they haven't raised the height in several others is beyond me. I can now barely stand viewing such species as Ring-tailed Lemurs, Red-tailed hawks, and the above mentioned Squirrel Monkeys, due to their low ceiling roundhouse enclosures.
Believe it or not, it was built for a temporary loan of giant pandas. After that it housed snow leopards for a few years. I seriously doubt they will ever go back on exhibit (even in Rainforest Of The Americas), because the reason they were pulled off is due to stress from being near the public (hair loss, etc).
Believe it or not, it was built for a temporary loan of giant pandas. After that it housed snow leopards for a few years. I seriously doubt they will ever go back on exhibit (even in Rainforest Of The Americas), because the reason they were pulled off is due to stress from being near the public (hair loss, etc).
Okay, I always wondered where the pandas had been on their visit.
Do you know what the history of all of those old aviaries up on the hill beyond the uakari exhibit is and why they are closed? I have always been curious what that story is.
Since I grew up in Los Angeles, I remember well as a child going through the old aviaries. They were not a walk-in aviary, but just a series of bird cages basically set up on stilts on the mountainside. My mother would take my cousin and I there every summer (at the least) and because it was such a steep stairway to get up there, she would wait at the bottom while we ran around up there. I seem to recall there were never really many other people up there, probably because of the steep climb and because birds are not that popular. We always enjoyed it, but I think more for the feeling of climbing around a treehouse than for the actual birds (I could not name one species that was there if my life depended on it). Anyway, here is a photo of the last time I saw them, and you can see the bottom falling out as they are literally crumbling apart. They had been closed many, many years before this due to safety hazard.
Since I grew up in Los Angeles, I remember well as a child going through the old aviaries. They were not a walk-in aviary, but just a series of bird cages basically set up on stilts on the mountainside. My mother would take my cousin and I there every summer (at the least) and because it was such a steep stairway to get up there, she would wait at the bottom while we ran around up there. I seem to recall there were never really many other people up there, probably because of the steep climb and because birds are not that popular. We always enjoyed it, but I think more for the feeling of climbing around a treehouse than for the actual birds (I could not name one species that was there if my life depended on it). Anyway, here is a photo of the last time I saw them, and you can see the bottom falling out as they are literally crumbling apart. They had been closed many, many years before this due to safety hazard.