Woodland Park Zoo Blog

It’s time for the Fall Fecal Fest —your chance to get your hands on our highly coveted Zoo Doo. Why would you want to do that? Garden enthusiasts know that Zoo Doo, made from the manures of the zoo’s non-primate herbivores, is the richest, most exotic compost in the Pacific Northwest . Also available is Bedspread, a composted mulch that is like Zoo Doo but contains higher amounts of wood chips and sawdust. Zoo Doo is so popular, we have to hold a lottery to decide who gets it. If you want to enter the lottery, send a postcard—postmarked from September 5 through September 20—to: Zoo Doo, Woodland Park Zoo, 601 N. 59 th St. , Seattle , WA 98103 . Include the following information: Name Day/evening phone numbers Preference: Zoo Doo or Bedspread Amount of Zoo Doo or Bedspread you’d like to purchase (anything from a garbage bag to a full-size pick-up truck load) Weekday or weekend preference for pick-up Pick-up dates begin October 4 through October 19. The lucky winners lo

We're kicking off our first-ever EcoWeekend beginning April 3 at the zoo. This is a pre-cursor to celebrating Earth Day and so we've combined several themes and events over four days to celebrate wildlife and habitat. April 3 is Leap Around the Zoo, a 1k just for younger children and their parents/guardians; April 4 is Primetime Primes, which celebrates the many species of primates AND marks the public announcement of our baby western lowland gorilla's new name; April 5 is Bear Affair and The Big Howl, complete with a non-safe campsite demo featuring our own grizzly bears. If you haven't seen this in years past, it's worth the trip to watch as they, shall we say, "dismantle" a campsite that's incorrectly set up for bear country (see the video of last year to the right in the Video Bar); and April 6 is the Coffee & Chocolate Festival which celebrates, with tasty samples, eco-friendly coffees and chocolate. For more details, visit the EcoWeekend

KIRO tv recently visited the zoo to film an iWitness Video presentation of lucky Zoo Doo lottery winners picking up their loads of rich, composted Zoo Doo. For those of you not in the know, Zoo Doo is the waste-products left from the zoo's herbivores (elephants, giraffe, hippo, gazelle and many more) that is gathered up and composted into an incredibly rich and fertile soil additive coveted by gardeners. The original idea for Zoo Doo came about more than 20 years ago when costs for disposal of the animals' waste was getting expensive, so it was decided to compost it back into a usable product for on grounds. The idea grew and now each year we host a Fall and Spring Fecal Fest that people can enter a lottery to win loads of the fecund fecal fallout. Now it's also recognized that this is a great way to reduce landfill and bring in a little extra money as well. To view the video http://www.kirotv.com/video/14312341/index.html To read more about Zoo Doo, visit this section of o