Toronto Z00 - Part 2

Continuing on with a tour of the zoo, the following photos were all taken by me during more than one visit. I guess that one could say that this is more a photo album than a blog. - although I will leave some comments.

Again, there are pavilions representing the various areas of the world with the appropriate wildlife housed in each one. In a sense, the entire zoo is laid out in a gigantic circle. When the zoo first opened to the public there was a monorail which circled the park and from which patrons could hop off and on at will, That route, upon leaving the 'Main Station' descended into the Rouge Valley stopping at the station there and then climbed back up to circle the African Savannah exhibit, then Eurasia, Oceania and Australasia. One day there was an accident when a train failed - as did the emergency stopping device - and it rolled back down the slope crashing into the train behind which had stopped at the Rouge Valley Station. A few people were injured but, thankfully, not seriously.

However, that put an end to the monorail and now there are 'bus trains' circling the grounds but NOT going down into the Rouge Valley - that is now a hike for the hardy.

Now I will post some photos from other exhibits. The grounds are landscaped - as an example, a forsythia bush.

An African elephant. The Toronto Zoo had a herd of them but. through deaths and trades with other zoos, there are only three left and, any day now, there will be none.

Bob Barker - the former games show host - is a huge fan of elephants so he is arranging that the remaining elephants in the Canadian zoos be transferred to an elephant sanctuary in California.


Just recently I saw a video clip of a small group of elephants arriving at that sanctuary. As they were being unloaded into a holding area, another elephant began trumpeting and came running over to the fence separating the paddocks. She recognized one of the arriving elephants from somewhere else in her life  - who knows where? They say that elephants never forget.

 A Barbary sheep. As I mentioned in my initial blog, the grounds of the Toronto Zoo are huge and so there is room for imaginative 'creations' to the landscape. The Barbary sheep is standing on the man made 'mountain' - as are the aoudads in the following photo.

The above photo is of a dhole - I cannot remember of which continent it is a native. I believe that it is a member of the canine family.  

All along the east side of the zoo grounds are large paddocks. The following are photos of some of the animals who live there.

This is an oryx.

A bactrian camel. Camel rides are available at the zoo - mostly for children.

Where Santa leaves his reindeer during the off season!

Barbary apes which live around Gibraltar - the only members of the primates native to Europe.

Przelawski horses - native to Poland. As you can appreciate from this photo - they have a fairly large pasture in which to roam and graze.

This is a snow leopard - native to Siberia. Sometimes the animals are just too pooped to pose!

Macaque monkey - native of Japan.

Sumatran tiger

Cheetah - the fastest creature on earth - isn't it?

King and Queen of the zoo

From the rear end it is hard to decipher whether this is a rhino or a hippo!

A giraffe of course!

Mother Orangutan and baby

Playful gorillas

Those two were having too much fun for there to be only one photo!

  An ostrich - what else?

A llama

Flamingos

I have no idea as to the name of this strange bird!

There are many many more animals than the ones which I have depicted and it would take many albums to show them all.

One of my visits to the zoo was when "The Lion King" was a huge hit. I walked through the African pavilion behind a woman and her young son. The meerkat and the warthog enclosures were virtually across the way from each other and, at each exhibit, she sang the song associated with those animals in the show.

If you should come to Toronto for a visit, I will be happy to go to the zoo with you!