Woodland Park Zoo Blog

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!

On July 4, the new tapir calf received her first neo-natal exam by associate veterinarian, Dr. John Ochensreiter. A quick weigh-in, a blood sample and some other tests and she's checks out well. Neo-natal exams are important in order to make sure that all the vital signs are normal and that the calf's overall health is good. Exams happen very quickly so that the calf can be returned to her mother. But mom received snacks while the baby was being looked over so she didn't even miss her!

After eagerly being anticipated for weeks, we were pleased when our female Malayan tapir, Kelang, gave birth to a healthy calf on July 3 at around 7:20 p.m. The 26-pound, female Malayan tapir calf marks the fourth birth for the 12-year-old parents. Striped and looking not unlike a four-legged watermelon, Malaysian tapirs only number somewhere between 900-3,000 in the wild. The calf will be off-view for awhile while the mother bonds with her, but a "tapir cam" is at the exhibit where zoo visitors can see them inside their indoor barn. Tapir gestation is approximately 13 months and an average birth weight is 22 pounds. A newborn tapir has a reddish-brown coat dappled with white and cream-colored spots and stripes. The unique coat pattern helps provide excellent camouflage in bamboo or reed jungles. The striped pattern begins fading after a few months and adult coloration appears by 5-8 months old. Tapirs are among the most primitive large mammals in the world, changing little

There will soon be a pair of new roars at the zoo. A new male lion, 8 years old, has arrived at the zoo and will live in the lion exhibit. The 424-pound African feline arrived in April from Knoxville Zoo. A new 8-year-old female arrived at the end of May from the Virginia Zoo. The lions belong to the South African subspecies, Panthera leo krugeri , and will be paired for breeding in the future. They will be introduced to their grassy new exhibit later this year. Photo by Ryan Hawk

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.

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