Model Zoo Exhibits

Ah! Britains Zoo Animals........ what a nostalgic treat!:)
I think I had most models going, in the late 1970s and early 80s. I used to have hours of fun making zoos in my bedroom. My parents still have 2 plastic buckets full of them somewhere at their house, along with various fences, and trees.
Some of them were very flimsy and small,e.g. Flamingo, Giant Anteater.
I always seemed to lose the tusks from the Elephants.
I haven't thought about them in years.......
 
I insisted on having a green carpet in my bedroom so that it would look like grass for my zoos. I was also concerned that it shouldn't be too 'fluffy' otherwise the animals wouldn't stand up. My parents got me green office flooring in the end! I'm told it was the first thing the new occupants changed after we moved house.
 
My miniature zoo model

Hello: My wife and I created a miniature zoo, "The Chincoteague Island Zoo" and have a website showing some of our displays. It's done in the same scale as Britains Zoo Animals.
Hope you visit us at:
Chincoteague Island Zoo

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Nice - and welcome to Zoochat!

You must check out the writings of forumster Miniaturezoo954. His project is..... well..... words cannot descibe it! You will find it extremely interesting!
 
Thanks, Dan.
Yes, I am very familiar with Daniel from Florida and you're right. His zoo is simply amazing!
John
 
I thought this might be the right thread for this. I was remembering an old Fisher Price zoo set I used to have as a child. I found a photo online (attached) and I'm curious if anyone else had it. A lion you could move back and forth, a big blue elephant, a hippos mouth which you could open, and you moveable animals you could put throughout.

Did anyone else have other zoo sets and have pictures of them? I remember having another zoo set with more room for the animals and then getting an animal pack that had the basic animals: Lions, Elephants, Hippos, Tiger and another series with marine mammals/birds. Each animal set had an an adult male, female, and two babies. Oh the good old days.
 

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While my kids were growing up, they (and I) were big fans of the Playmobil line of zoo animals and exhibit pieces (PLAYMOBIL Zoo). We've kept them all for the next generation and I'm sure will add to it again when the time comes!
 
I think the playmobil animals are quite nice, they have a certain stylised look rather than super realism but at least there is a wide range of species to a common scale and they are mostly poseable.

Safari have just realised a range called Wildlife Wonders which are unusually large replicas. The panda and polar bear look very nice but some are less realistic in my view.
 
thought i'd bump this and see if anyone else has any memories? i have a large collection of animals (mainly scherlchl (spelling) safari and seaworld brand), and they are all being proudly displayed on my shelf's in my room :D
 
Newzooboy said:
Check Britains Zoo Animals out on E-bay. Reckon you could build the complete collection if you so desired (and were prepared tp pay for it). Apparantly the Platypus is the real rarity as since it was to scale of the other animals it was the 'most lost' animal in the collection. :p
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They used to sell Britain's Zoo Animals in the London Zoo gift shop. After decimilisation, the shop sold off platypus models at 1p each. I remember being given a handful of them, because I was the only one interested in them. I don't know what happened to the models.
 
Writhedhornbill said:
I have some very old Scleich animals, and some of the newer ones. I want them to make tapirs!
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Hallo Writhed Hornbill. Have you heard of Tapir and Friends Animal Store? It has a collection of plastic and fluffy toys of various types, including the aquatic genet, banded palm civet, spotted linsang, fossa, ring-tailed mongoose, aye-aye, tarsier, Coquerel's sifaka, pangolins, various extinct animals and all four species of tapirs. I must admit that my favourites are the swine flu virus and stuffed plush heartworm (Plastic Insects (Bugs), Spiders, Stuffed Insects and Spiders (Insect, Spider Toys, Jewelry, Gifts)) - surely a Christmas present for the child who has 'everything'.
 
I've always been interested in miniatures and in the last year or so I've thought about somehow doing up a miniature zoo, but I haven't, yet.

Currently my collection includes 3 Cheetahs that I keep on a shelf above my desk at work and some other cats on a shelf at home. I'm not sure what the maker is, but I bought them at a dollhouse store so they're more realistic and not like those in the Big Cats Toob you can buy at the toy store.

I need to get my brain going on setting something neat up.
 
New Orangutan Exhibit at Chincoteague Island Zoo -a zoological garden in miniature

 
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When I was a child, I had a huge number of model animals which I carried around in a battered old black case. I also had a model keeper with a hunk of gory meat on the end of a pitchfork. But I never could find anywhere to set them out properly. What I dearly wanted as a kid, but was never lucky enough to possess, was a model zoo with cages, ponds, paddocks, etc., but I don't think such a thing was manufactured. So I had to make do with a model farmyard as my zoo, but this of course only had about 2 or 3 animal pens and a small duck pond. Even today I often think how great it would be for some manufacturer to produce model exhibits (such as a replica of London Zoo's original Mappin Terraces). There's definitely a gasp in the market here. How about a model reptile house where the roof lifts off to reveal the reptile tanks within? Or even a model gift shop or cafe, so that children of today can build themselves a complete model zoo?
I still look at the toy animals whenever I find myself in a toy shop buying presents for friends' children, and my goodness aren't they expensive. Most retail from between £3 - £6. To have the same number now that I once owned when I was young would cost a fortune. They're still as detailed as ever they were, but now there seems less concern to keep them to the same scale, and a Bald Eagle is the same size as an Ostrich.
 
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