Orangutan

Sumatran Orangutan (Pongo abelii)

These great apes were off exhibit for almost a year while the zoo constructed a new habitat for them. The grand opening was in September and it has been fun to see the orangutans get more and more used to their new home. Pictured here are two of them. The first is the mother of the one on the right. They like to come up close to people and watch them. In the videos, the mother is showing off her ghost disguise. I have seen her do this at least twice and the second time she came up to the window and “surprised” some people.

Bats

It is Halloween and I thought this would be appropriate. There are two species of bat at the Zoo:

Rodrigues Flying Fox (Pteropus rodricensis)

And

Egyptian Fruit Bat (Rousettus aegyptiacus)

They are one of my favorite animals at the zoo. Of all the animals, the bats are always visible and they are always active. They also almost always have food. It is fun to watch them climb around with those wings. 

Rodrigues Flying Fox

Egyptian Fruit Bat

Lion

African Lion (Panthera leo)

To make up for a long absence, I am doing a larger post about a very popular animal that can be found at most zoos. I don’t know why they are so popular, except that we are told to think so, from movies, TV, and books. Everytime I see them at the zoo they are usually sleeping. So this time was a nice surprise. The lions were actually awake and some were being active as seen in this video. It shows a lioness being very interested in several small children who were laughing and having fun…though I think the lion was more frustrated than anything else.

This was fun to watch and it was also nice because my sister, Elina, had come that day with Ruth and I. Here is Elina with that same lion. I was impressed at how large they really are.

Duiker

Duiker (Cephalophus rufilatus)

This is an animal I hadn’t heard of. I learned that it is pronounced “dye-ker.” They are a very small antelope species from Southern Africa. The zoo has two of them and they are in an enclosure with several bird species. What seems to be the dominate animal in the enclosure is the hooded vulture (who I’ll add latter). As I watched the duikers, they would constantly be chased by the vulture. These things are only about 15 inches tall and weigh about 31 pounds. They are kind of cute.

Emerald Starling

Emerald Starling (Lamproptornis iris)

One of the birds found in the Vollum Aviary. I think it is my favorite there. This bird is from the Ivory Coast of Africa and sports a beautiful metallic green feather pattern. Though it is hard to photograph, because it doesn’t sit still for very long.

Red-eared slider

 

Red-eared Slider (Trachemys scripta elegans)

That’s right they have several George-Michaels (our pet turtle) at the zoo. It is strange to see something that you have at home at the zoo. And also see that they act the same. This little male is using a larger female to get as close as he can to the lamp. It is fun to see so many swimming around though.

Naked Mole Rat

Naked Mole Rat (Heterocephalus glaber)

These little adorable monsters are from Eastern Africa. They live in groups in large networks of tunnels. At the zoo, they have a special room you can walk into where their burrows are set up like a large ant farm, so you can see everything.

Ruth interrupting here: When I first went to the naked mole rat enclosure, I searched all their little windows to find the little guys. There are several windows, most of them empty. In one window I noticed a water dish and some chopped up vegetables: celery, lettuce, and yams in large orange slices. “No rats there,” I said to myself and continued looking. I found another window with what looked like whole yams stacked up. “Are they saving those for winter?” I wondered to myself. “That seems unnecessary.” Then one of the yams wiggled his tiny nose at me and rolled over. That pile was mole rats and not yams at all. So, I recommend for camouflage tactics that naked mole rats hide in grocery store produce sections near the root vegetables. If they stay very still, no one will recognize them…