Weirdest/Oddest Zoo exhibits

Too many zoos look the same. They are full of cliches that become passe as soon as they catch on - shark tunnels, bat caves. It is one thing to have conservatism for practicality like in shed cities, quite another to repeat the same old if you can splash the cash. At one point it was kitschy Oriental themes, but now the fad is immersion though is too often self delusional: let enclosures be unashamed enclosures. Let them have dark or surreal humour like the plane crash exhibit.

We need more exotic exhibits. Zoo design is architecture, let it be playful if it doesn't impair the pragmatism or welfare. An example might be Lubetkins penguin pool: not like I enjoy the look of raw concrete and the costs of upkeeping concrete decently outmatch the low cost at onset, but does it deserve the flak it gets, functionally? The Snowdon Aviary however was a bad design - it was not the only example among super aviaries however.
 
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Some examples I saw on pictures from Japan but cannot trace to a zoo.
One was a great panda exhibit which featured a bathroom with tiles and a WC, and a room with replica of Giant Wall of China.
Another was a room where walls were seal aquarium and the seal to surface for air had to dive under the floor and up the glass cylinder in the middle of the room.
Another was otter exhibit with a water-filled glass bubble projecting to the visitor area, in which the otters could swim. That one looked rather positive, allowing close contact with animals.

There were also some very weird exhibits in the USA in the 1960s or so, modernist with absolutely no consideration of needs of live animals. One was a sort of rock hollow with two circular rocks in the middle, which was designed for 4 spectacled bears.

I cannot trace them to photos, maybe somebody else can. :)
 
Anything mixed with a species not found in another species' region is always weird to me (minus aviaries which seem to not stick out so much to me for some reason, maybe I'm so used to Bird Kingdom). Llamas/alpacas are frequently mixed in with African hoofstock for some reason; African Lion Safari has them in their hoof stock reserve. The Americas paddock seems a better habitat for them.

Toronto Zoo's old polar bear exhibit. Weird Avant Garde art design or something. Probably innovative for it's time but ew. Just a corner of it:
cbf8799aa9f6986c9638ea3f4b140d9f--toronto-zoo-canada-toronto.jpg
 
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Meaghan Edwards said:
Anything mixed with a species not found in another species' region is always weird to me (minus aviaries which seem to not stick out so much to me for some reason, maybe I'm so used to Bird Kingdom). Llamas/alpacas are frequently mixed in with African hoofstock for some reason; African Lion Safari has them in their hoof stock reserve. The Americas paddock seems a better habitat for them.

Toronto Zoo's old polar bear exhibit. Weird Avant Garde art design or something. Probably innovative for it's time but ew. Just a corner of it:
cbf8799aa9f6986c9638ea3f4b140d9f--toronto-zoo-canada-toronto.jpg
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As long as there is some shade or natural substrate what's wrong with this one?
 
Jake said:
I always thought that a SNAKE HOUSE was for SNAKES ONLY
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Speciesim, much? ;)
For the sake of convenience, few animal houses are really to the letter when it comes to their inhabitants. That's why you can see amphibians and invertebrates in reptile houses, small mammals & birds in giraffe / "pachyderm" houses, non-antelopes in antelope houses, etc. etc. Gila monsters and snakes have been proposed to both belong to the clade Toxicofera; maybe you can convince Australia Zoo to change the name to TOXICOFERA HOUSE ;)
 
Batto said:
Speciesim, much? ;)
For the sake of convenience, few animal houses are really to the letter when it comes to their inhabitants. That's why you can see amphibians and invertebrates in reptile houses, small mammals & birds in giraffe / "pachyderm" houses, non-antelopes in antelope houses, etc. etc. Gila monsters and snakes have been proposed to both belong to the clade Toxicofera; maybe you can convince Australia Zoo to change the name to TOXICOFERA HOUSE ;)
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Hahhahah yeah they should. They recently got king cobra and western diamond back rattlesnakes
 
How many of the following theming are in Pairi Daiza Zoo:
-crashed planes,
-human skeletons and skulls,
-sculptures and reliefs of an elephant or elephant-headed deity (presumably Ganesh)?

My estimate is: 2, over 30 and over 100. Any Belgian zoo fan counted exactly?
 
Komodo99 said:
This thread is to discuss the times where you have either heard of or seen an animal enclosure or display at a zoo that has made you go"Huh,that's odd".You can share your reaction to said exhibit as well.

Personally for me,it would have to go to Blackpool Zoo as when I visited earlier this year I noticed that they had a mealworm exhibit and some Common House Spiders in the old tarantula enclosure.
Mealworm exhibit

Mealworm exhibit

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Photo I took of the mealworm exhibit.
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As part of an ecology display, I once fenced off an active meat- ant mound and included it as an example of a decomposing species.
 
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