Toronto Zoo Toronto Zoo Future Developments 2014

I'd just like to clarify some things I have seen here.

Eurasia: The building for both the snow leopards and birds of prey is completed. What is causing the delay is the mesh and poles for the exhibits. They have also started landscaping the rest of the Eurasian Wilds exhibits.

As for snow leopards: I am pretty sure we have only had one since late last year…
 
Hmmm, conflicting reports. Now I'm a little confused on what's complete and not complete.
 
Quartz92 said:
I'd just like to clarify some things I have seen here.

Eurasia: The building for both the snow leopards and birds of prey is completed. What is causing the delay is the mesh and poles for the exhibits. They have also started landscaping the rest of the Eurasian Wilds exhibits.

As for snow leopards: I am pretty sure we have only had one since late last year…
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I believe this is accurate. From the fences and the zoomobile on Monday I could not see that building but I could see extensive landscaping in places and workers in others.

Dare we hope a Clouded Leopard pair has arrived, not the Snow Leopards?
 
Im confused too.

What Quartz92 has to say makes more sense to me. They have had a year for constuction of the building and a late thaw would slow down outside work. They likely thought they could start working at the start of April or even sooner but winter held on longer this year. I could see if they werent able to dig and set things until the middle of April or later, that the zoo would have to put things off about 2 months. That timing makes sense. Plus the arrival of the eagles and Kota makes sense in that case.

On the other hand its hard to dismiss Sealife357 because they had their placement at the zoo really recently and had access to places and people in the zoo that the rest of us dont.

We might just have to wait and see what happens.

Quartz92 you are right that we only have had snow leopard, Tiga, since sometime last year. They sent Kota to Safari Niagara to free up space until the new exhibit was ready. We may be recieving a third snow leopard, Sherri, from Edmonton. It was mentioned in the snow leopard SSP from 2013. But whether the coordinators knew Kota was returning wasnt apparent. Sherri might have been recommended to fill space at our zoo so Edmonton could get in another breeding animal or just breed. She might have been recommended to come to breed with Kota when he arrived home too. Hard to say. It doesnt offer that kind of insight. In this case it will be a purely wait and see scenario.

It would be nice if the clouded leopards arrived too. Time is ticking on that import permit.
 
For those of you who wonder what the old zoo mobile route looks like the zoo is running an Annual International Migratory Bird Day where you can book guided bird tours that run along the old route, Saturday May 10th.

Toronto Zoo | Special Events
 
I should mention when I was there was the beginning of April. When I was there they had the frames for the floor down, and so by now they should have a lot of it up. As I understand they removed the old interior rock work and such in the fall (which O+D had scent marked with the goats).

There is two snow leopards in the Health Unit, or rather were, cause they had one successful blood draw from the tail, and an unsuccessful, so it could be Tiga and Sherri, or Sherri and Kota. They never mentioned names at the Morning Meetings so it's hard to say.

I didn't hear anything about Clouded Leopards, but they MAY have moved the red panda from Malayan Woods back to Eurasia as there were two RPs out on exhibit on one of my last days, in order to prep for the CLs. But I can't remember how many RPs we have so I could be mistaken there.

Sorry for any confusion.
 
There are three Red Pandas - the female Maki was still in the Clouded Leopard exhibit Monday. I wish they would put her back outside, even if it means leaving the exhibit empty.
 
Looks like Er Shun has decided to challenge Da Mao's status as Toronto Zoo's youtube rock star.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1f475ubyoHY

But then Da Mao comes back out swinging with cuteness in a bucket.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXmFDoXfOWM

Winner? Us!

Clearly they have someone monitoring them more then I origionally thought. They have a great camera set up in both indoor dens and at least Da Mao's outdoor but probably both. Geeze zoo switch them out for webcams. How much adorable stuff are we missing? I will take the few short videos but I would love the full time webcam.
 
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Two moronic teens hopped a fence to take a selfie with Humphery! They stupidly touched him! He might be cute and all but hes still a polar bear and dangerous. The zoo was too kind to them by letting them continue with their day and by working with the school to prevent pressing charges. I say press the charges, against the kids who are old enough to freaking know better and the supervisor... where in the world was the adult who was supposed to be watching them?!!! Ban them and the supervisor from the zoo! They are extremely lucky he didnt bite them... and we all know how the zoo ends up losing in that case.

People like them make me extremely angry! I could rage on but wont.

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/201...ands_toronto_students_on_slippery_ground.html
 
Typical teenagers, doing stupid things for the attention. Just imagine what would happen if they where attacked are injured by Humphrey? There would be a firestorm.
 
Oh I know the zoo would be ripped apart in the media, sued for letting the kids anywhere near him and there would be idoitic calls to get rid of him.

The thing I want to know is where on earth was their supervisor?!!! Really? The zoo gives schools a ratio of kids per adult based on age. Just because they are teens doesnt mean the supervisor should just let them go. They are teens. They are prone to stupidity and wreckless behaviour. Frankily they need to be more supervised then 5 year olds. I've been to the zoo with younger kids as part of school groups and the kids were never out of my sight for a split second. Its called being a responsible adult. If one of the kids was eaten by a polar bear it would be my fault for not watching them properly. They need to find out who the supervisor was and ban them from the zoo because clearly they dont care about zoo rules. There's a darn good reason the zoo demands so many supervisors for so many kids.

The sad part is that it will just convince other teens to try something similar because this pair of twits got so much media attention. Which means the zoo will be forced to clamp down more, erect higher fences obscuring our views more or distancing us further from the animals or block off areas all together. Sadly the ones who suffer in this case are zoo staff who have to be even more vigilant thanks to people who think barriers, warning signs and rules are for others, and rule abiding visitors like the rest of us.
 
Out of the many times I've been to the zoo, whenever there were schools there the older teens usually didn't have an adult supervisor. The younger children did, but the older ones just stayed in group of 4 or more. When this is the case, you can usually tell that the teens think they can do whatever they want, although most of them know better about crossing a fence. In this case, I think these teens where just plain knuckleheads that were trying to look cool in front of their friends.
 
I have seen roaming teens too. Last year there was a rude group of unsupervised teens who were being completely inappropriate and if I had had younger kids with me at that time I would have asked for their school name and headed right for the nearest staff member to complain about the lack of supervision. The zoo demands supervisors. Sadly most supervisors just turn the teens loose. They wont get lost like little ones but they need a firm hand nearby to keep them in line so they dont ruin the day for others or get themselves into trouble.
 
TZFan said:
I have seen roaming teens too. Last year there was a rude group of unsupervised teens who were being completely inappropriate and if I had had younger kids with me at that time I would have asked for their school name and headed right for the nearest staff member to complain about the lack of supervision. The zoo demands supervisors. Sadly most supervisors just turn the teens loose. They wont get lost like little ones but they need a firm hand nearby to keep them in line so they dont ruin the day for others or get themselves into trouble.
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Looking at the School section of the Zoo's webpage, the supervisor ratio for secondary students is 1:20. While I think the Zoo would love for secondary students to be more closely supervised, I think it's an impossible situation. Schools are not going to get parent volunteers to go on trips with high school students and getting additional teachers to go is not an option (can't afford the supply teachers needed to cover classes). Even if schools brought more supervisors, the supervisors are not going to stay with the students- its just how it works with high school students unfortunately.
 
school trip or no school trip this was bound to happen. Teens/kids are going to do things like this. It's not right but that's the way things go. There are areas of the zoo where kids/teens/adults can jump barriers and to think that they won't is crazy. When I was a teenager I jumped a barrier (not at the TZ) and hopped into a wombat exhibit to wake it up. Completely and utterly inappropriate, but I was a teen and I was stupid. Earlier this week I saw pictures of Prince Charles feeding Hudson. I bet back in the day as a stupid teen if I had seen that photo I would have thought I too should be allowed to feed a polar bear - who wouldn't want to! It's wrong and I would never suggest otherwise. But barriers are made for a reason because people are stupid and teens are selfish. The only answers are better barriers or TZ staff in areas where the barriers can be jumped.
 
You make good points kknudsen. I guess the most they can do is make it so the people who do jump the barriers can't actually get in contact with the animal via fence or extra barrier, which I'm all for. I just hate when it impedes my way of seeing a photographing the animal.
 
Every time I am at the zoo I see such behaviors, and not just teenagers, but yesterday, after the publicized incident, I was getting very angry at the things I saw.
Three little boys chased a peacock into some shrubbery and had it cornered. Couldn't tell who they were with so went and shooed them away. They went over to a man sitting at a picnic table with his back turned, on his 'phone. Those boys were 6 at most!
Elsewhere, three adults were beyond a fence with a "do not enter" sign on it, taking pictures, and did not move until a zoomobile was heading right toward them.
I agree with adams7 and kknudsen; it's hard to know what to do about teens, caregivers not paying attention, or adults who disregard warning signs. They can't possibly have staff patrolling everywhere, but there are security staff on the grounds. Maybe keepers and those at that level or higher should be able to call a security guard and have people escorted off the site after their names are taken and a warning issued. Next time, they could be banned, or the police called. I do not know the legalities of that, but it is a city property and such warnings are issued on TTC property, and probably elsewhere. The Rogers Centre usually takes offenders right out of the stadium. The zoo would be concerned about publicity but they can always point out it's for the people's own safety.
Or . . . electrified fences for visitors, not animals . . . no, can't do that.
 
Yesterday there was construction at the lions (the steps at the main viewing area were gone), the giraffes' new exhibit in three different places (behind the holdings, the viewing deck, new fencing behind and between the farm and the hippos), the first Panda outdoor exhibit (?), huge rocks being moved away from beyond the ostrich outlook, and I did not get to any of the areas related to the Americas, or to Eurasia.

Some butterflies are out in Malayan Woods with many more to come - along with the remaining orchids it's very pretty. But there and in Indomalaya, the Black-breasted Turtle exhibit has been empty all winter, the Tree Shrew exhibit almost as long, and the exhibit beside the Gibbons has been empty for years. None of this is very appealing to visitors.
 
Mr Wrinkly said:
Yesterday there was construction at the lions (the steps at the main viewing area were gone), the giraffes' new exhibit in three different places (behind the holdings, the viewing deck, new fencing behind and between the farm and the hippos), the first Panda outdoor exhibit (?), huge rocks being moved away from beyond the ostrich outlook, and I did not get to any of the areas related to the Americas, or to Eurasia.

Some butterflies are out in Malayan Woods with many more to come - along with the remaining orchids it's very pretty. But there and in Indomalaya, the Black-breasted Turtle exhibit has been empty all winter, the Tree Shrew exhibit almost as long, and the exhibit beside the Gibbons has been empty for years. None of this is very appealing to visitors.
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The panda exhibit work that I saw was related to the fencing, but there may be other work being done as well. There should also be construction work going on near Caribou Cafe and Mayan Temple for the installation of the zipline (https://twitter.com/SoaringEagleZL/media).

I'm not 100% sure, but I believe that the tree shrew has passed away, which would explain the empty exhibit. Which exhibit beside the gibbons are you talking about- the tank or the aviary?
 
Yes, I heard the Tree Shrew died, but the exhibit was emptied at least 5 months ago.

This exhibit: http://www.zoochat.com/532/indo-malaya-pavilion-366117/
Sorry, I try to remember to say (gallery) when I put a picture up that is relevant to a post. I heard that there was a water problem that has been fixed, but I think that was at least a couple of years ago.
 
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