Day Nine: Prospect Park Zoo and New York Aquarium
Another of WCS's small park zoos, at 12 acres, the Prospect Park Zoo is about double the size of the Central Park Zoo and around two-thirds the size of the Queens Zoo. For the most part, its exhibits are not structured in any zoogeographic way, but Discovery Trail, the largest outdoor part, is an Australasian region.
When entering the zoo, it is impossible to miss the central exhibit: yet another for California sea lions (the only species in all WCS-run facilities?). It's in the same style as all the rest (except the aquarium) but is suitable enough. From here, the zoo is best toured in either a clockwise or counterclockwise direction. I did it in a counterclockwise direction.
The first exhibit, open without appointment only on weekends, is a small room called Discovery Corner. It is geared towards children, with a play area and eye-level exhibits for a few turtles and hissing cockroaches. There is indoor viewing for a red panda exhibit, and the only available viewing in the zoo for a great horned owl. The enclosures are nothing to write home about.
Aviaries lead to a barnyard area next. Two larger exhibits have Himalayan monal, and one shares with white-crested laughingthrush. The other two exhibits are the aforementioned red panda exhibit and one for silver pheasant.
The barnyard area is another generic exhibit, characteristic to most children's zoo areas. Goats, sheep, waterfowl, etc.
From here, you enter the Hall of Animals. It's essentially a lot of terrariums, but has animals other than herps. The first room has several exhibits, and two species I hadn't seen before. One was Solomon Island spiny-necked monitor.
And the other was African yellow white-eye, in an exhibit with Australian finches, unfortunately moving far too fast for a decent photo. Another room talks about animal lifestyles, and is a dark room with several rarities: brush-tailed porcupine, woylie, and Madagascar giant jumping rat. Unfortunately, the fan in the enclosure of the latter broke so it was off exhibit (it shared with a loris of some kind). Disappointing, as the one at Bronx was sleeping once, and awake, but hidden the other time. A long hall, mostly with amphibians, constitutes the other part of the building. I saw blessed poison frog for the first time, which was cool.
Animal Lifestyles is the final indoor exhibit. The first room is a rotunda, with exhibits from several areas. One cool exhibit has wreathed hornbill and Victoria crowned pigeon.
I had to edit this photo a bit more than I'd normally like to, for it to be clear, and as such, it's a bit dark. I'd appreciate any feedback.
Another has a sleeping Pallas' cat. Well, it was sleeping for me, but everyone else of ZooChat seemed to see it awake, based on the gallery. I never see Pallas' cats awake, but at least I could see part of its body, rather than the complete no-show at Columbus or the ear at Cincinnati. The first dedicated Brazilian exhibit I've seen had golden lion tamarin and rock cavy, as well as red-footed tortoise.
The back of the building featured a large hamadryas baboon exhibit. I rarely see baboons in zoos, is there a reason for this? I think I've now seen hamadryas twice, olive once, guinea once, and gelada (if you consider it a baboon) once, and that's it. It was fun to watch them, especially a mother that prevented her baby from running off by grabbing hold of his tail. One other cool exhibit in this building had lettered araçari, and I think there's only one other holder in the US.
This building was pretty neat, with some uncommonly seen species, and most of the enclosures weren't bad for their inhabitants, space-wise, even being indoors.
Discovery Trail is the final exhibit, and the main outdoor exhibit at the zoo. It begins with black-tailed prairie dog, which is quite strange, as the rest of the trail is predominantly Asian. There is a large lake, home to rare species such as Baer's pochard, and a few areas for children to play. The next are was Australian in theme, with the rarest species being dingo. They were the most active dingos I've seen, and I believe this is the fourth place I have seen the species. The visitor area appears to have formerly been a large walkthrough for kangaroos, wallabies, and the like, but the animals were no longer there. Smaller enclosures for emu, red panda, and African crested porcupine follow, the latter seemingly out-of-place here, as is the next exhibit, for North American river otters. After this, a nice and spacious exhibit for the rarely-seen tufted deer, as well as demoiselle cranes, is found. The final exhibit here (and in the zoo) is the aviary. It's apparently been home to rare and cool species such as red-knobbed imperial pigeon, and Chinese hwamei, but all the birds I saw generally stick to the ground. It was very cool to get a good look at the beautiful black-necked crane.
I definitely liked the Prospect Park Zoo, a small place that I will certainly revisit given the chance.
New York Aquarium:
Still in the process of rebuilding after Hurricane Sandy, this aquarium is
really small. Concept art posted throughout looks promising, though, and a return will be warranted after the expansion's completion. As it stands, though, there are only four exhibits, three of which have less than five tanks.
The first exhibit is Glover's Reef. It is one large main tank and two or three off to the side. They all contain reef fish, though one is a coral growing exhibit. Next is Conservation Hall. Several freshwater fish are exhibited (and some, bred) here, including the Madagascar rainbowfish.
There are exhibits here for various African lakes, such as Lake Malawi. There was also one on the Amazon River. It was a nicely presented exhibit.
The remaining two exhibits are viewed from outside. Sea Cliffs has exhibits for marine mammals (California sea otter, harbor seal, and California sea lion) as well as black-footed penguin. There used to be walruses, but unfortunately they have all moved to other facilities. The concept art does indicate a "Beringia" exhibit with a walrus, so hopefully that comes to fruition! The exhibits are all suitable, but size for the mammals could be improved.
The last exhibit is the temporary home for sharks, and I am very glad it is temporary. It is a boring, poorly-lit tank with a few species of shark and ray. Sea turtles are signed, but the tank is small enough I can't have missed them if they were in the tank. Based on the gallery, it apparently used to hold beluga whales, which is even worse. I suppose it is adequate, but is a smear on the otherwise well-run WCS facilities.
These were two very nice, if small (and with their bad spots) facilities. After the aquarium, I enjoyed the beach of Coney Island, and then entered Luna Park to ride the Coney Island Cyclone, one of the most famous and oldest roller coasters (which I do enjoy) in America. It was most certainly a rip-off at $10 a ride, but a cool one-time experience to ride a ride that this year will be 90 years old.
And that wraps up my New York trip! I will keep reviewing the Bronx Zoo piece by piece, assuming people are reading my posts
and will eventually piece together the reviews in threads under the appropriate forums.
