Woodland Park Zoo Blog

Posted by Katie Remine, Living Northwest Conservation Coordinator and Bobbi Miller, Wildlife Conservation Manager Just because we’re practicing physical distancing, doesn’t mean we can’t do our bit for wildlife and the great outdoors! There are still plenty of ways you can engage in conservation actions right from your living room or backyard. Woodland Park Zoo’s Wildlife Conservation staff invite you to join them as a wildlife conservationist with these five activities you can do from the comfort of your couch (or hammock)! A Seattle Urban Carnivore Project motion sensor remote camera documents a group of raccoons in the greater Seattle region. Photo courtesy of Seattle Urban Carnivore Project / Woodland Park Zoo and Seattle University. 1) Report your sightings of urban carnivores Woodland Park Zoo and Seattle University’s Seattle Urban Carnivore Project explores how mammalian carnivores, such as coyotes, foxes, raccoons, bobcats, and even cougars and bears live and inte

Posted by: Gigi Allianic, Communications A new exhibit for North American butterflies and a stage for up-close experiences with animals such as skunks and pot-bellied pigs are among the new features coming to Woodland Park Zoo in 2016. Photo: Dennis Dow/Woodland Park Zoo. The butterflies and new ambassador animals will highlight a previously underused area of the zoo near the popular Zoomazium. The new outdoor stage is expected to be a real highlight for zoo guests who want to get up close and personal with these animals. In addition—to mark its 10th anniversary—Zoomazium will see a refreshment of its programming and technology. Photo: Ryan Hawk/Woodland Park Zoo. Right next door will be the new Butterfly Garden, a completely new exhibit to replace one closed during the 2009 recession. Zoo guests will enter a covered area, stroll among free-flying butterflies, and explore the various habitats of North American butterfly species while learning about the biology, behavior

Posted by Elizabeth Bacher Looking for the perfect way to honor that rad dad or fabulous father figure in your life? We have a few ideas to spark joy for Father’s Day—coming up June 19. Xerxes was a wonderful father to his cubs. Photo: Dennis Dow/Woodland Park Zoo Share a unique experience with Critter Connections * Each experience (20-25 minutes in total) features three of our ambassador animals for you to meet and greet. Whether it’s one of our furry mammals, a fine feathered friend or a rascally reptile, each one of our animals has a personality all their own and each can teach us something to help save wildlife. Plus, you can’t beat this unique photo-op and selfie opportunity! https://www.zoo.org/critterconnections Surprise him with tickets to Whiskey & WildBites * Experience Woodland Park Zoo after-hours while enjoying delicious cuisine prepared by more than a dozen of Seattle’s premiere chefs paired with several of the finest whiskey tastings this area has to offer. This adul

Flamingos are getting all the attention these days, but there’s another exhibit opening this weekend that you don’t want to miss… The always popular Butterflies and Blooms exhibit re-opens for the summer season on Fri., May 23 (now free with zoo admission). You’ll be surrounded by nearly 1000 free-flying butterflies representing 15 North American species . If you’re lucky, you may even get one to land on you. Here’s a tip: butterflies are attracted to bright colors! Zebra longwing butterfly , photo by Dennis Conner.

Posted by: Kirsten Pisto, Communications Roses are red, violets are blue…unless you’re a tetrachromat, it’s true. Apologies for the obvious segue to a post about color, but I couldn’t resist!  A blue bellied roller and a brightly colored orchid show us examples of some of the beautiful colors here at Woodland Park Zoo. Photos by Ryan Hawk and Kirsten Pisto/WPZ. Throughout the animal kingdom, there is enormous diversity in the structure and faculty of eyesight. Oftentimes, we relate our own human eyesight to the visual capabilities of animals, but most evidence points to the contrary: in fact, humans might be an underdog in visual perception. A rainbow sits over the North Meadow. Red has the longest wavelength and blue has the shortest. Photo by Dennis Conner/WPZ.   The human eye sees a wide range of what we call visual color, that is , measurable wavelengths in the range of about 390–700 nanometers. Our eyeballs have a ton of tiny little cones and rods in th

Butterflies & Blooms is one of the zoo's most popular exhibits. Because the butterflies are native species to the U.S., the exhibit is seasonal, operating in the summer months when these species would normally be breeding and flying. With several dozen species, from the striped zebra longwings to even an occasional dramatic-looking luna moth, the B&B tent is a nice respite from walking around the zoo's 92 acres!

Posted by: Sue Andersen, Zookeeper Early last month, Woodland Park Zoo Collection Manager Erin Sullivan and I took a road trip for conservation to release captive-reared caterpillars as part of a new zoo program to recover the wild populations of the state endangered Taylor’s checkerspot butterfly. The release into the wild may be the exciting and deeply rewarding climax to this pilot program, but the story begins with the arrival to the zoo of 510 very sleepy, fuzzy black caterpillars that were just waking up from almost six months of diapause (winter resting). The caterpillars were hatched and reared at Oregon Zoo last summer before entering the natural resting period late last summer. At Woodland Park Zoo, the larvae were set up in plastic bins where they were fed, watered, and carefully monitored for about 10 days. During their stay, the caterpillars ate like, well, very hungry caterpillars! Along with my fellow keeper Diane Abbey, we harvested nearly 100 plantago leaves per

Sunday, September 30 is the last day for our Butterflies & Blooms exhibit for 2007. The butterfly exhibit is one of our most popula perennial exhibits. If you haven't gotten to see it yet this year, you've got until Sunday, otherwise it's a long wait until next May! Photo by Ryan Hawk

Woodland Park Zoo has participated in the Oregon silverspot butterfly breeding project for the last since 2000. These beautiful butterflies have not been seen in the wild, mostly the dunes and meadows along the Washington, Oregon and northern California coast, since 1990. Wanting to head off extinction, WPZ, along with Oregon Zoo and support from the Washington and U.S. Departments of Fish and Wildlife, The Nature Conservancy, U.S. Forest Service and Lewis and Clark College are "headstarting" silverspots for release at our two zoos. We bring in eggs and care for them over the winter until they pupate. Just last month, staff from WPZ took down 162 pupated silverspots for release into a protected area on the Oregon Coast. In total, we have produced 492 pupae for release. We're happy to be helping one of our native butterflies survive and eventually thrive once again in our region.

Posted by: Rebecca Whitham, Communications With recent bear sightings in Bothell and Renton, and the start of camping and cook-out season, we want to make sure you are prepared with essential tips for living with wildlife here in the Pacific Northwest. We’re dedicating June 4 to a day of programming that will show you how to avoid attracting bears to your home and campsite, while also showing you how to attract wildlife you do want to your backyard, including birds and butterflies. Join us June 4 for our annual Bear Affair and Big Howl for Wolves presented by Brown Bear Car Wash . You’ll meet bear ecologist and adventurer Chris Morgan who’ll make a guest appearance for bear demonstrations and a book signing. Watch grizzlies rip through a mock campsite and a yard setting in the naturalistic grizzly bear exhibit. Learn safety camping tips by Boy Scouts. Talk to representatives from Wolf Haven International and Conservation Northwest. Get up close to a Karelian bear dog and find

Plus meet Dr. Robert Long, WPZ’s first Senior Conservation Fellow Posted by: Dr. Deborah B. Jensen, President and CEO President Jensen. Photo by Matt Hagen. December 2013 marked the 40th anniversary of the Endangered Species Act, a successful, complex and at times controversial federal law that has protected many of our most prized wildlife species from extinction. As we enter the New Year, the future of two native Northwest species hangs in the balance. Currently, gray wolves are being considered for delisting from the Federal Endangered and Threatened Species protections, while Oregon spotted frogs are being considered for listing . Under other circumstances, it would be hard to find a stage, outside of a Grimm brothers’ fairytale perhaps, in which both of these species shared a national spotlight. At the zoo, kids are learning all about wild wolves and other carnivores, including humans’ misconceptions of them, in our Zoo Crew and new Coexisting with Carnivores educat

Plus our heartfelt thanks to Deborah Jensen for 13 years of service! Posted by: Bruce Bohmke, Acting President and CEO Bruce Bohmke. Dear Friends, As zoo members, supporters and partners, you are an integral force in the success of our mission. You also have a vested interest in the future of your zoo. So, on behalf of all the zoo staff and board of directors, it is my pleasure to introduce you to Woodland Park Zoo’s new Strategic Plan 2015-2018: Growing our Reach and Impact. You’ll be proud to know that Woodland Park Zoo is already recognized as a standard-setter among top zoos and aquariums in the U.S. With this plan as our compass, we will evolve to meet our community’s current and future needs, while further shaping and modeling the purpose of zoo-based conservation organizations in the 21st century. Because a significant rise in population is anticipated for the Puget Sound region, we must dramatically increase our reach and impact to serve a growing community. But