Woodland Park Zoo Blog

Posted by: Rebecca Whitham, Communications We’ve been watching the counter on our YouTube channel for the last few days waiting for the magical moment, and it’s finally here—we’ve reached 10 million video views! It all started back in 2006 when we launched our YouTube channel and one of our very first videos, “Cute Baby Tiger,” remains our most popular video to date: Now more than 60 videos later, we want to take the time to thank you all for watching and sharing our stories about the amazing animals at Woodland Park Zoo and the work we do to provide excellent animal care, conserve animals and habitats around the world, and provide engaging, educational experiences. We could not have done it without you! What animal or zoo topic would you like to see a video on next?

Hadiah the Sumatran tiger turned 1 year old today and was treated to a special holiday-themed treat: a paper-mache "reindeer." To attract her, keeper rubbed musk, a favorite sensory treat, to the outside of the paper critter and she rolled, ripped and thoroughly enjoyed her day, even though she didn't know it was her birthday! As a special treat for you, we've created a Hadiah screensaver for your computer. Simply click on the photo, download and follow your computer's settings to load as your screensaver. Enjoy!

Today was the perfect day for Hadiah to make her first forays out into the outdoor tiger exhibit. She rambunctiously played, sniffed and rolled around in the bushes while visitors looked on. Only around 400 Sumatran tigers still exist in the wild; each birth is cause for celebration to help keep genetically viable populations intact. How can you help tigers? Watch what you buy (for example, plam oil, which is in thousands of products, comes primarily from Indonesia where forests are being destroyed to plant palm oil plantations, so look for foods and products that do not contain it); don't buy exotic wood products that aren't from certified sustainable forestry practices; donate to organizations helping to conserve tigers and their habitat.

Hadiah, our 7-month-old Sumatran tiger, will make her outdoor debut on Wednesday, July 11. She and her mother, Jo Jo, will romp and play (and probably do a lot of sleeping in our recent heatwave!). She will be out daily from around 11:00 a.m. to around 2:00 p.m. Come and visit them!

After a gorgeous weekend and more than 4,000 zoo visitors on Saturday and nearly as many on Sunday, Monday is gray and dreary! However, the Day Exhibit, which has dozens of reptiles on exhibit, the historic carousel and the other indoor exhibits are very popular. Hadiah, the Sumatran tiger cub, has had her tremendous growth spurt slow down a bit. She was given a beef bone and cinammon sprinkled on a couple of rocks in her exhibit. Felines love spices and she loves to sniff around looking for the many hidden treats. She still gets a kick out of dunking her stuffed animals in her water tub.