March 29, 2004

• A couple of weeks ago, we went to the zoo with our son Andy, our daughter-in-law Jess and Jake the Giant Baby. We are fortunate to have two very nice zoos in the Twin Cities. The Como Park zoo in St. Paul is what I think of as a traditional zoo. The animals live in large cages or in relatively small outdoor exhibits and tend to be of the exotic variety, including giraffs and gorillas. The Como zoo is free and is set in a huge and very beautiful park, which makes it a lovely summer family outing.

  
  

   Our trip was to the Minnesota Zoo in Apple Valley. It is much larger and not free. Many of the animals there are species that can survive the Minnesota winters, so there are many very large outdoor exhibits. The animals are provided with as natural a setting as possible, with plenty of space to roam and ample opportunity to escape the eyes of zoo visitors, so walking the trails becomes a game of hide and seek sometimes and the zoo suggests coming back later if animals are not visible. If you have a sharp eye, you can see musk ox, caribou, moose, wolves, wild horses, Takins, and Siberian tigers. My favorites are the prairie dogs. This particular day we did not walk the trails, however, because it was quite cold and that would have required keeping Jake outside too long. We started our zoo tour with the tropical fish and the dolphin exhibit inside. Andy was taking pictures and managed to get this one of two of the dolphins as they jumped.

  
  

  

  Here is a phote of Jake and me as we watched the dolphin show. If I had known I was going to be photographed, I would have put on make-up.
  

  

  Here’s Jake on my husband’s lap. As you can see, Jake was paying close attention and enjoying the show.
  

  

  
  

  We did walk out onto the trail far enough to see the meerkats. They had been brought into a building for the winter, since their home in Africa is just a tad warmer than Minnesota in the winter.  During the summer, they are outside.

  
  

  Meerkats are funny creatures.  One of them is always on guard duty, standing upright on his rear legs and constantly scanning the area for danger.  If he spots anything suspicious, he alerts the rest of the colony.  As usual, the sentry was doing his job.  However, he did not seem to think it was a problem for my six foot four inch son to walk up to this little guy to snap a picture.  Meerkats have no natural fear of humans.  This is the second meerkat photo.  The first was a rather nice close-up if this little guy.  When he saw the flash, he came running right over and my son snapped this one of the little fellow literally looking into the camera lens.  Meanwhile, the guard continued to watch for shady characters and ignored us completely!

  
  

  

  On our way back from the meerkat exhibit, we stopped to see the snow monkeys.  They are another of my favorites and are able to endure our winters, so you see this charming chap seated on a branch capped with real snow.  I enjoy standing and watching these monkeys groom each other or watching the mothers cuddle their babies.  On this day, there was not much grooming going on.  Their main objective seemed to be keeping warm.
  
  
  

  

  
  

  The zoo has a large nocturnal exhibit which has several species of bats, skunks, owls, and other night prowlers.  The area is dark during the day so the animals are awake, then they turn lights on at night so they will sleep.  I like that area, particularly the fruit bats.  I think they are really cute.

  
  

  We had a great time at the zoo.  It’s a wonderful place for a family outing!
  

  • 8:09 am
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