Turning 100 years old next year, the Little Rock Zoo is the only zoo of any particular size or significance in Arkansas. Much of the existing zoo was built almost simultaneously by the WPA as part of the New Deal, which has the advantage of giving much of the zoo a uniform look and feel, even if some of the older enclosures now appear somewhat outdated, while having the disadvantage of being historic. The campus is not especially large (33 acres), but still holds a large collection of diverse species.
Upon entering the zoo, visitors may be lured down a winding path through a series of open paddocks, which house a variety of animals with no particular geographic grouping. Island habitats for siamangs are followed by enclosures for giant anteater, Indian crested porcupine, Chacoan peccary, maned wolf, duikers, and red river hogs. A few species of tall savannah birds - southern ground hornbill, cranes, and secretarybird - can also be found here. These are pleasant, simple exhibits of decent size and furnishing, holding species which will be of interest to many zoo enthusiasts, but perhaps glanced over quickly by guests that aren't as interested in animals that they haven't heard of before.
The path then enters the Cheetah Outpost, which serves as sort of a gateway to the zoo's African Savannah section (if not for the intrusion of some Asian and South American species, I guess you could consider the yards that were passed to get her part of the savannah as well). Inside the building are naked mole rats, along with a few terrariums of smaller African reptiles. The building provides overviews of a spacious cheetah savannah, which in turn abuts against a grassland habitat for ostrich, plains zebra, and wildebeest. Across the path is a mesh-enclosed primate exhibit, home to Angolan colobus and spot-nosed guenons, as well as a paddock for black rhino.
A path looping off from the cheetahs leads to a trio of open-topped big cat yards. These exhibits are decently large and well-furnished, if not the most exciting I've ever seen. Well, two of them aren't that exciting, at any rate. One is for the lions, one for the tigers, and the third is only the second open-topped jaguar exhibit I've ever seen in an American zoo. And unlike that other exhibit, this habitat has a large tree in the middle of it, and I was, for the first time in a lifetime of seeing jaguars in zoos and several years as a jaguar keeper, looking up at a jaguar over my head, with only air in between us. A few small cat habitats are nearby.
The zoo's weakest point is probably a set of rockwork-backed grottos, set in a circle, which traditionally were the bear dens. One of these is still used for bears - sloth bears, to be precise - and may be the weakest exhibit I've seen for this species in an AZA zoo (but by no means the worst bear exhibit I've ever seen). As for the other exhibits, the zoo has responded in a fairly sensible manner by using those exhibits for animals considerably smaller than bears. Two yards hold two species of otters - North American, and the rarely-exhibit spotted-necked otter of Africa, while another holds bush dog, charismatic little South American canines that are seen at very few US zoos.
Tomorrow, we'll continue our exploration of the Little Rock Zoo
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