San Diego Zoo New Map!!!

Thanks for the link Mario!! What's with the name changes? No more "canyons"? Urban Jungle? Lost Forest instead of Ituri Forest? Also, I see that there is no mention of horses and donkeys in Elephant Odyssey.
 
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According to the most recent Zoonooz, the changes are to make navigation and giving directions much easier for visitors.

Also...
Over the next few years, our animal care staff will be gradually moving animals to new zone homes, although much of the Zoo is already set up to seaily make the transition.
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Urban Jungle? Africa Rocks? The Lost Forest? So, is the whole bioclimatic concept dead?
 
Ituri said:
Urban Jungle? Africa Rocks? The Lost Forest? So, is the whole bioclimatic concept dead?
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Given Pallas cats in the "Arctic" and Freshwater crocs in "Sumatra" (Tiger River), I think it's safe to say zoogeography was never taken very seriously in San Diego.

SDZS has been completely "taken over" by theme park/hospitality business management. The relatively new SD Zoo director's previous position was General Manager of the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco! This map shows the continuing progression towards becoming another Busch Gardens with a better animal collection. Although the domestic horse and donkey in Elephant Odyssey confirm that even the collection aspect of the Zoo is slipping!
 
Yeah, and when a lot of these exhibits opened it was taken very seriously. There were arctic fox instead of Pallas cats (and the exhibit now hosts an Arabian wildcat). The freshwater crocs were preceded by gharials, but before that they had the more geographically appropriate tomistoma (that one now holds a mix of Australasian turtles)
 
reduakari said:
This map shows the continuing progression towards becoming another Busch Gardens with a better animal collection.
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While I'm not sure I agree with your assessment, IF you're correct then that sounds VERY good to me! Busch Gardens is great, with its only weakness being a limited animal collection.
 
Whether bioclimatic zones were taken seriously or not in the past is definitely debatable, but in my personal opinion the new names for certain zoo zones are absolutely dreadful. "Urban Jungle", "Africa Rocks" and "The Lost Forest" could apply to an extremely broad range of animal exhibits.
 
What exhibits exactly would urban jungle apply to? Pigeons, rats and cockroaches?
 
reduakari said:
SDZS has been completely "taken over" by theme park/hospitality business management. The relatively new SD Zoo director's previous position was General Manager of the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco!
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Is this for real? How could arguably the best and most respected traditional zoo in the country not get a director with a lifetime of animal experience? They certainly have the reputation to hire anyone they want from the zoo industry. This is very troubling to me as an SD member. :(
 
Arizona Docent said:
Is this for real? How could arguably the best and most respected traditional zoo in the country not get a director with a lifetime of animal experience? They certainly have the reputation to hire anyone they want from the zoo industry. This is very troubling to me as an SD member. :(
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Read it and weep:

Imperial Valley News - John Dunlap Joins San Diego Zoo as New Director

The senior executive leadership at SDZS came out of Busch Gardens and Knotts Berry Farm.

There are still some very good "animal people" at many levels throughout the organization, but the people now at the top all come from a commercial entertainment business background--as appropriate for a huge commercial operation like what SDZS has become.
 
reduakari said:
Given Pallas cats in the "Arctic" and Freshwater crocs in "Sumatra" (Tiger River), I think it's safe to say zoogeography was never taken very seriously in San Diego.
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Are you talking about the crocs next to the pygmy hippos? I wouldn't consider that part of tiger river.
 
No they are talking about the freshwater crocodiles in the old gharial pool in tiger river, not the slender-snouted crocs by the pygmy hippos.
 
I've been to the zoo many times including just a couple weeks ago, and I'm not sure what you're talking about.
 
Ituri said:
Yeah, and when a lot of these exhibits opened it was taken very seriously. There were arctic fox instead of Pallas cats (and the exhibit now hosts an Arabian wildcat). The freshwater crocs were preceded by gharials, but before that they had the more geographically appropriate tomistoma (that one now holds a mix of Australasian turtles)
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As I said before, it now houses turtles at the top of Tiger River, right after you leave Monkey Trails
 
Ituri said:
As I said before, it now houses turtles at the top of Tiger River, right after you leave Monkey Trails
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Ok, I responded to reduakari without looking at your post. The turtles aren't a bad example of what is being complained about imo, and I didn't even realize it was a part of Tiger River.
 
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