Sonora Desert – This was perhaps my favourite section of North America, as this large domed building features innovative exhibits and is brilliantly planted both indoors and along the visitor pathway outside. The first exhibit is for these species: Anna’s hummingbird, verdin and lesser goldfinch, with a gopher snake in a separate burrow set into the rockwork. A greater roadrunner/gila woodpecker/Gambel’s quail enclosure is nicely designed, and a desert tortoise/desert iguana/blue spiny lizard/crevice lizard open-topped area was also above average. Free-flying birds such as black-chinned hummingbirds, Gambel’s quails, Inca doves, house finches, white-winged doves and horned larks were all over the place, and an average ocelot enclosure was built alongside part of the wall. An Isla San Esteban chuckwalla/desert box turtle exhibit is excellent, and there are loads more terrariums that are quite cleverly built into the rockwork alongside the visitor pathways. A nocturnal area features skunks, coatis, vampire bats and ringtails, amongst smaller desert dwellers.
