Jaguar Exhibit almost open

The final spot of construction for the Rainforest of the Americas is nearly complete, Can\'t wait to see the jaguars finally having a lot more room to stretch out - and the sightlines for photographers look pretty decent as well. Only thing missing now is more cover, for patrons as well as the jaguars. It gets pretty toasty over on this side of the zoo!

Is there an exhibit to the left of the path, that you look down into?

Nope, that is just a safety rail since the path winds down.

And thanks for the photos Oddernod!

Just a longish winding road with a kiosk at the end — for a couple days when the rainforest opened they were trying to sell some things there, but it's not a high traffic area just yet.

Ummm - where are all the plants?

I wondered the same thing when Rainforest of the Americas opened up — there was barely any cover to speak of anywhere, but when you walk through it now, it's starting to finally fill in. In my opinion they've made some odd choices in terms of cover and plants for the entire exhibit. Even now at the jaguar exhibit, between the walkway and the rock wall there are some tall banana plants I think.

To be honest, I want to love the whole exhibit but it seems like much of what was planned hasn't worked out to date. The giant river otter area is huge, but often the slide isn't running or worse, all of the water has been completely emptied out. The tapir viewing angles are really frustrating if she isn't chilling out by the glass. The cotton-top-tamarins, even though they are essentially the mascots for the exhibit, are missed by most. There was a giant hanging seat structure that people took pictures in that apparently broke and hasn't been replaced. The red uakari are in an exhibit behind a fence that you can't even approach. And the three or four exhibits behind glass at the end of the trail suffer from a very difficult glare problem most hours of the day.

That said, the three black howler monkeys are a joy to watch, especially with the new baby — and when the giant river otters are out and the slide is running, there isn't a better place to sit and watch in the whole zoo.

D'Oh - more like "Desert of the Americas"... I have to say I was very disappointed with RotA, and while this extension doesn't look very rainforesty, it doesn't look like a bad exhibit.

How many enclosures are there here - just one? And for how many jags?

From what I can tell, only one large enclosure. I haven't kept count, but if I remember there was one jaguar on display in the roundabout near the taco stand — and recently I believe there were two more jaguars on display in the old snow leopard exhibit? I'm sure someone has a more accurate count than I.

What are the red and blue things on the fence supports Oddernod? It's a pity they hadn't planted the bananas up in front of each of the said posts. that would have helped to 'hide' them i think they will suffer a lot of root compaction planted just off the path as people try to get a closer look at the exhibit.
Is the enclosure planted too?

The red and blue things are metal butterflies that have donor names. Can also be seen on this photo: http://www.zoochat.com/578/jaguar-exhibit-almost-open-403189/