Best and worst local zoo exhibits

Alex Bensky said:
Upon reflection I'd keep the penguin house as Detroit's best exhibit and the Farm in the Zoo as its worst.

This is edited because after posting the above I found out that they are in fact going to do something about the Farm in the Zoo exhibit. I'm not sure I'd spend $24 million on this but no one asked me. It's not clear how much of the South American exhibit will be taken up by this.

For years I've thought they need a small mammals house but apparently no one agrees with me.

Detroit Zoo to invest up to $24M on KidZone, prairie dogs, anteaters
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I wouldn't spend up to $24M on a Farm exhibit either and would much prefer a small mammal house
 
At home the closest zoos to me are Cameron Park Zoo and San Antonio Zoo

Cameron Park:
Best - Herpetarium
Worst - Macaw Habitat(If you have seen it you will understand)

San Antonio:
Best - Cat Grottos/Wings of Wonder
Worst - Birds of the World steel cages(Hard to get photos through)

During College, the closest zoos are Palm Beach Zoo, Brevard Zoo, and Zoo Miami

Palm Beach Zoo:
Best: Florida Loop/South America Loop
Worst: Axolotl cave(you can tell this exhibit was originally designed for something else since it has a land portion, the Axolotls are also off exhibit frequently, imo the entire cave should have more exhibits)

Brevard Zoo:
Best - Rainforest Revealed
Worst - Red Ruffed Lemur habitat(Hard to photograph through, and a little on the smaller side)

Zoo Miami
Best - Amazon and Beyond/Florida Loop
Worst - Bat Exhibit(So hard to see what is which species and getting photos is a nightmare!)
 
Zoo Miami
Best: South America aquarium
Worst: Like what King of Komodos said, the bat area was not the best.

San Diego zoo
Best: Most of the large aviaries
Worst: Like what most people say, most of urban jungle and bear grottos

SDZ Safari park
Best: Main savanna, platypuses
Worst: Hard to say. Maybe some of the reptile areas, but I don't truly know.

Seaworld San Diego
Best: Sharks, Penguin encounter, Atlantis aquarium
Worst: Dolphins, sea lions

Birch Aquarium
Best: Kelp Forest
Worst: Sharks

Lion Country Safari (First visit in many years)

Best: Drive through parts
Worst: Pied Hornbills
 
Bactrian Deer said:
Indianapolis Zoo:
Best: IOC or up and coming ICC
Worst: The entirety of Flights of Fancy

Mesker Park Zoo:
Best: Indian Rhino Complex
Worst: Northern Leopard Tortoise Pen
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In my opinion the worst exhibit at Indianapolis is actually by far the grizzly bear grotto. The bears live on 100% concrete surfaces, and they paced for most of the time I was there, which is pretty bad. I actually enjoyed flights of fancy— the flamingo mingle in particular was a lot of fun.
 
ZooElephantsMan said:
In my opinion the worst exhibit at Indianapolis is actually by far the grizzly bear grotto. The bears live on 100% concrete surfaces, and they paced for most of the time I was there, which is pretty bad. I actually enjoyed flights of fancy— the flamingo mingle in particular was a lot of fun.
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I forgot to put the flamingo area out of the worst category. I hate the aviaries in flights of fancy because it is just a tree or 2 with pebbles everywhere with no water feature or theming. The Bear grotto is also bad but at least it has a water feature. Also, flights of fancy is newer (opening in ‘12) and the Bear was there when it opened.
 
The aviaries aren’t as bad for the animals as the grizzly exhibit, though. Even if trees are a little lacking they still have climbing structures, rock piles, rafters, and the netting itself. The Arctic Fox exhibit is even pretty good given the space. The grizzly exhibit has a pool but doesn’t give the bears any soft surfaces or opportunities to dig.
 
Persephone said:
The aviaries aren’t as bad for the animals as the grizzly exhibit, though. Even if trees are a little lacking they still have climbing structures, rock piles, rafters, and the netting itself. The Arctic Fox exhibit is even pretty good given the space. The grizzly exhibit has a pool but doesn’t give the bears any soft surfaces or opportunities to dig.
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I wouldn't call any of the aviaries in Flights of Fancy bad. Not naturalistic by any means, but not bad.
 
Greater Vancouver Zoo
Best: Tie between the cheetah enclosure and the zoo's adult grizzly bear enclosure, with both holding a single animal. My photos don't do them justice but both enclosures are on the larger side for carnivore exhibits at the zoo, and are full of natural, lush vegetation.
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[Image by yours truly.]
Worst: To echo @RIPPompadour's earlier comment, the current puma enclosure is awfully small for two adult cats, and while I don't have a photo of it on hand, I believe it used to be used for either a badger or lynx, if that gives folks any idea of its size. I'd also like to nominate the hippopotamus exhibit (which has already drawn criticism) and the Southern white rhinoceros/red river hog enclosure. Both are rather barren and, for the latter, surely on the small size for an animal as large as a male white rhino...
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[Image by yours truly.]

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Vancouver Aquarium
Best: Graham Amazon Gallery (mixed-species indoor jungle with free-moving birds, reptiles, etc.)
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Worst: B.C.'s Wild Coast Exhibit (i.e. the outdoor pools), though especially those of the sea otters and penguins, which seem rather cramped.
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Bloedel Conservatory (bonus entry)
While the entire conservatory is essentially one big enclosure, the duality between what the free-flying smaller birds (e.g. budgies, finches, canaries, etc.) get to experience, as opposed to the stationary large parrots (e.g. macaws, parrots, cockatoos, etc.) who are regelated to single perch with little to no enrichment items has always bugged me.
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Smithsonian's National Zoo
Best: Giant pandas
Personal favorite: American Trail (I just love the theming and landscaping so much here, even though I don't know if any individual exhibit is particularly noteworthy.)
Worst: I don't know if it's actually 'bad' from an animal welfare perspective, but I do not personally enjoy the indoor Great Apes house. The smell is overwhelming and the design is so dark and dingy and brutalist.

Maryland Zoo
Best: Penguin Coast
Personal favorite: African watering hole (I know it's not the most world-class, but the National Zoo doesn't have anything like this and I love to watch it.)
Worst: Probably Lemur Lane, though I do like the new tunnels!

The weird thing about the Maryland Zoo is that I think their chimp exhibit is one of their ugliest, yet as far as I can tell, it's a functional exhibit that meets the animals' needs and is probably my favorite exhibit to visit. Both indoor and outdoor habitats seem to have really active animals, interesting relationships between the chimps, and lots of enrichment. While the caging is unappealing, it's really cool to watch the animals climbing it.
 
Zoo Osnabrück
Best: Unterirdischer Zoo (complex)
Since it's not a single enclosure it doesn't really count, but none of the enclosures could be listet as the best of the zoo. Despite that it's the most unique area the zoo can offer. The complex is modelled after a mine shaft and the enclosures on the walls mostly display the tunnelsystems of the animals. The species include rarities like Mechow’s mole rat and coruro (they sadly stopped keeping real moles).

My personal favourites are the chimp enclosure with it's massive outside enclosure and planted indoor area and the sand cat house (which will probably be replaced by the elephant park...).

Worst: Orangutan
One could probably argue that the macaws don't have the best aviaries but the orangutan (and gibbon) enclosures were reopened 2017 after a huge remodeling, but don't hold up very well in comparison with other enclosures which were build at a similar time or earlier like in Dortmund or Gelsenkirchen. The old ape house was simply remodeled. The former orangutan outdoor cage was transformed into a large indoor section (by far the best part of the enclosure) and the outdoor enclosures former used by chimps and gibbons were extendet vertical. In my opinion it wouldn't be the worst if they just kept a pair of red apes but since they keep two pairs (which can't mix) the animals didn't really get much additional space after the reopening (also a lot of mock rock is used).

Alwetterzoo Münster
Best: Afrika-WG
The best is probably the new Meranti hall with the very nice looking giant otter enclosure (but it's not completly finished and I only was in the hall during construction...).
Despite that the best enclosure is the Afrika-WG since it is mostly lush, has a nice mix of species and the water moat with it's bridges and pelicans looks really pleasent.

Another favourite of mine are the leopard enclosures since they really make a good use of their height

Worst: Lion / Fossa enclosures
The zoo tries it's best to keep it's lions happy and the indoor areas already got a nice extetion and general makeover but the old outdoor enclosure is just too small. The animals have access to two adittional cages but it still is not the ideal way to keep lions. The fossas live in the same house and have similar outdoor cages but in my opinion space is still an issue considering how active the species is.

Naturzoo Rheine
Best: Bird house
It's really hard to pick in this case since there are many awesome enclosures in the zoo like the sloth bear enclosure, penguin aviary or the area for lemurs. I just picked my personal favourite which is the bird house with the largest population of weaver birds outside of africa or it's amazing wader aviary which are both walktrough.

Worst: Desmarest's hutia
It's equally hard to pick the worst enclosure in Rheine since the standard is really high but Desmarest's hutia enclosure just doesn't stand out and is located in the old monkey house which is not the nicest to look at. Still animal welfare don't seem to be an issue.

Tierpark Nordhorn
Best: Geierfelsen
The aviary has a nice species mix (Griffon Vulture, Bald Ibis, Ibex, Terrapin) and is very well structured. There are multible viewing opportunities at different heights so you can have a nice look at the vultures.

Worst: Seals
The pool is very small and the water quality seems bad (at least at my last visits).
 

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Ross park zoo:

Best:
Wolf woods. It’s a spacious, beautiful enclosure that is literally as naturalistic as can be. Plus, it has amazing and immersive viewing.

Worst: Hard to decide, but probably the lemur/red panda house. It could be worse, but both exhibits are old fashioned cages with little space and are not naturalistic.
Also, the Puma enclosure, and the tiny terrariums surrounding it. The Cougars have a truly miniature, unnatural exhibit.
I am pretty sure that it is no longer there, but the Mata mata bucket is absolutely horrendous.
 
Seaworld San Antonio
Best: Penguins, First large tank in the Explorers reef, Bottlenose dolphins
Worst: Lionfish

San Antoinio Zoo
Best: Kangaroos, Larger bird areas by the main pond, Giraffes, Camals, The one flamingo area where you can feed them (they have a lot of flamingo areas)

Worst: Most of the row of bird cages (I was realy disappointed seeing a Raggina bird of paradise without a speck of natural looking space), young Komodo dragon display, smaller cassowary yard
 
Homosassa Springs Wildlife Park

Best: Otters, Manatees

Worst: Hippo (Hardly any land space)

Mertalors Mermaid Aquarium

Best: Springs exbibit, mermaid performance tank
Worst: Ornate Wobbegong
 
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